Mark Meland

Practice Areas

Real Estate, Corporate and Transactional Matters, Condominium, Multi-Family and Mixed-Use Development, Corporate Law

Career

Mark Meland co-founded the firm in 1993. Mark is an accomplished real estate lawyer handling the entire lifecycle of real estate transactions. His diverse client base includes sponsors, developers, entrepreneurs, individuals and lenders in commercial and residential multi-million transactions across the United States.

Professional Memberships

• Member, American Bar Association

• Member, Miami-Dade Bar

• Chair of the Board of Trustees, Young Musicians Unite

• Board of Trustees, Greater Miami Jewish Federation

Work Highlights

• In 2022, closed over $1.2 billion in transactions covering all asset classes, including multi-tenant, mixed-use, retail, office, hospitality, condominiums, industrial, and multifamily.

• Recognized by the Daily Business Review for closing $764 million in transactions across asset classes as part of the publication’s Florida Legal Awards in 2021.

• Meland Budwick represented New York-based real estate investment firm, ESG Kullen, in a variety of transactions in support of ESG’s strategy to continue acquiring over 4,400 units in multi-family properties and condominium projects. Notably, as the multi-family market has continued to gain strength, these strategies have proved to be fruitful and the need for greater creativity and sophistication in closing such deals. This includes various debt and equity structures, recapitalization strategies, and expanding ESG’s geographical footprint outside of the FL market. Over the past year, Meland Budwick’s real estate team has closed approximately $400 million in transactions for ESG.

• Represented Fuse Funding in both its hard money loan transactions and various matters to creatively acquire real estate, including winning the $18 million credit bid in bankruptcy auction on the Metronomic Portfolio in Miami, FL; working in conjunction with the Bankruptcy team to win the 17 properties Fuse had a first position mortgage on; acquiring the WeWork Security Building in downtown Miami, FL by purchasing the note on the property from the existing lender who had filed a foreclosure action, and accepting a deed on the property from the owner/borrower in exchange for dismissal of such action, and completing over 20 loan closings, totaling over $250 million.

• Acted as general counsel for Crown Linen in various transactions, including the $61,750,000 sale leaseback transactions of six industrial properties in Florida and Georgia.

Experience

Mark’s expansive real estate practice combines complex corporate work into many real estate transactions, including formation of entities, debt-equity structures and joint venture agreements. Mark serves as outside general counsel to corporate clients representing many of them in M&A transactions involving sales and acquisitions of businesses. Mark prepares condominium, master and other types of documents for residential, commercial and mixed-use projects. This work includes real property sales and acquisitions, financing transactions and restructurings, bulk condominium sales and acquisitions and condominium terminations, for numerous large and prominent projects.

Mark represents individuals and businesses seeking to obtain capital for corporate and real property transactions. His lender representation includes hard money loans, commercial and residential loan workouts and the financing of real estate acquisition and construction.

Mark’s practice also includes workout and bankruptcy advice and transactions for those negatively affected by the market, seeking to capitalize on the distressed market or acquiring debt or equity positions. He acted as a court appointed Receiver for numerous entities and was an approved Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Trustee for high-profile companies.

Education

Awards