Manatt partners Tom Muller, Timi Hallem and Keith Allen-Niesen have been recognized as three of Los Angeles's top 40 real estate lawyers in the July 22 Los Angeles Business Journal's "Who's Who in L.A. Law" report. For 2013, the annual list focused exclusively on the city's most successful real estate attorneys who can walk a business (that is looking to lease, buy or sell) through the legal process and achieve the best possible result.
In its profile of Tom Muller, co-chair of Manatt's Real Estate & Land Use Practice, the Los Angeles Business Journal says Tom "has been achieving extraordinary outcomes for his real estate investment trust and other real estate developer and investor clients in their largest and most important transactions, with deal sizes typically exceeding $100 million." His recent work includes helping client The Macerich Company, a Standard & Poor's 500 real estate investment trust, acquire a 1.2-million-square-foot superregional mall located in Brooklyn and a 1.8-million-square-foot superregional mall in Valley Stream, New York.
Timi Hallem, chair of the firm's Hospitality Practice, was profiled on her recent representation of real estate investment firm Kennedy Wilson in its acquisition of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Lake Tahoe from a consortium of four lenders. The 5-star hotel on the Northstar ski slope resort was constructed for over $300 million, but had been repossessed after developer defaulted on a $165 million loan. In December 2012, Hallem's client purchased the hotel in a transaction that spanned about seven weeks from negotiating the purchase to closing the acquisition. The business journal says Hallem is a "leader in the areas of real estate and hospitality law" who has had "great success representing major developers, lenders, owners and operators in all economic climates."
Of Keith Allen-Niesen, the publication notes that the Manatt partner has for more than two decades been representing REITs, private and public companies, and domestic and foreign investors in real estate and land use deals that are "greatly shaping California development." For the owner of Del Amo Fashion Center, the largest retail mall in California, Allen-Niesen helped get approval from the City of Torrance to renovate and redevelop the Center. He worked closely with the client and the City to modify a previously approved development permit and complete the appropriate CEQA documentation.