John Bain Discusses Trends in the Real Estate and Hospitality Sectors with Metropolitan Corporate Counsel

Akin Gump real estate partner John Bain has been profiled by Metropolitan Corporate Counsel in the article “To Make Deals in Hospitality Today, You Need to Be Creative: As the challenges mount, lawyers need to adapt,” discussing his practice and the state of the hospitality sector.

Among the topics covered in the interview:

• The future of hospitality and leisure, given disruptive competition from various private accommodations aggregators and evolving customer expectations: “A lot of sectors are facing changing customer demographics, technological advancement and similar variables. These variables create opportunities for disruptive competition and newcomers. The existing players have to adapt and respond in order to survive.” Bain noted that adaptive responses include “seeking out strategic partnerships with newcomers or purchasing them outright – and, of course, consolidation that creates operational efficiencies and broader customer loyalty programs.”
• The impact of private investment funds on real estate transactions: Hospitality “fits the private equity model, which is basically to enter into a deal or purchase an asset, hold it for a defined hold period and exit prior to the end of that period.”
• The challenges of working with financing sources from overseas: “I think the challenge that’s discussed most now is capital controls. This is the common term used to describe regulatory schemes that governments put in place to control the outflow of capital from their country. There are specific regulatory agencies within these countries that have to review each proposed investment and approve it. …The other big-ticket item is tax structuring. That requires tax counsel experienced in creating structures that account for the specific tax challenges presented by the source of the funds.”

To read the full article, please click here.