Residential

  • December 05, 2025

    Manufactured Housing Cos. Ditch Price-Fixing Claims

    An Illinois federal judge has tossed a proposed price-fixing class action against multiple manufactured housing companies and a data company, ruling the proposed class failed to show the businesses conspired to jack up rent prices.

  • December 05, 2025

    Mass. IOLTA Panel Says It's Owed Slice Of Residual Funds

    A Massachusetts panel that oversees Interest on Lawyers' Trust Accounts asked the state's highest court Friday to at least partially unwind a $4 million class action settlement, saying a lower court didn't give it a chance to argue for a portion of what it says are "significant" residual funds.

  • December 04, 2025

    Dems Press CFPB's Vought On Mortgage Rate Shutdown Plan

    Senate Democrats are demanding clarity on the fate of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's benchmark mortgage-rate work if the Trump administration lets the agency go dark, warning of imminent potential chaos for the $13 trillion mortgage market.

  • December 04, 2025

    Miami Resident Claims City Extorts Land For Permits

    A Miami resident told a Florida state court that the city is subverting the eminent domain process by unconstitutionally extorting land from homeowners in exchange for building permits.

  • December 04, 2025

    Zillow's Climate Score Removal Sparks Insurance Concerns

    Zillow's recent decision to reduce the visibility of a climate-risk feature attached to its real estate listings highlights a need to provide consumers with more information on a key driver of insurance costs, given differences in climate-risk modeling practices.

  • December 04, 2025

    OFAC Fines Real Estate Firm $7M Over Sanctions Violations

    The Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control fined a New York property management company more than $7 million for allegedly violating Russian sanctions by receiving payments on behalf of a company owned by a sanctioned Russian oligarch.

  • December 04, 2025

    Gov't Watchdog To Probe FHFA Mortgage Fraud Referrals

    The Government Accountability Office will review whether Federal Housing Finance Agency Director William Pulte weaponized mortgage fraud investigations against the president's perceived political opponents and flouted the agency's typical investigation process.

  • December 04, 2025

    Judge OKs Plan Disclosures For AmeriFirst In Ch. 11

    A Delaware bankruptcy judge agreed Thursday to grant conditional approval for bankruptcy mortgage servicer AmeriFirst's disclosure statement outlining its Chapter 11 plan, finding the objections raised by the U.S. Trustee's Office are best reserved for the plan confirmation hearing.

  • December 04, 2025

    Mortgage Insurer Inks $650K Deal To End ERISA Suit

    A mortgage insurance company has agreed to pay $650,000 to close a worker's proposed class action filed in North Carolina federal court claiming its mismanagement of an employee retirement profit sharing plan caused a $1.3 million loss.

  • December 04, 2025

    Morgan Stanley, MorningStar Close $305M Housing Deal

    Morgan Stanley Investment Management and MorningStar Senior Living, with Morgan Stanley Real Estate Investing's managed funds, acquired a 463-unit MorningStar senior housing portfolio located near Denver for $305 million from Kayne Anderson Real Estate, the two companies announced Dec. 4.

  • December 04, 2025

    Yardi Reports Widespread US Rent Decline In November

    Rental industry analyst Yardi Matrix reports that multifamily rents and demand each sagged for the fourth straight month in November, a broad trend that visited cities both with and without new supply coming to market.

  • December 04, 2025

    NAR Says Realtor Rule Changes Not Relevant To Antitrust Suit

    The National Association of Realtors and local Realtor groups at the center of a proposed class action have urged a Michigan federal court not to allow real estate brokers and agents to bring recent NAR handbook changes before the court in their antitrust suit.

  • December 04, 2025

    Over 2 Dozen Countries Commit To Property Tax Transparency

    A group of 26 jurisdictions committed on Dec. 4 to adopting a framework developed by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development to facilitate the exchange of real estate information among tax authorities.

  • December 03, 2025

    Chats Show Ex-NY Gov Aide Was Tight With Chinese Officials

    Jurors weighing the fate of a former aide to two New York governors have seen a raft of chats and other documents over several days that the feds say support their case alleging she violated the Foreign Agents Registration Act, including communications that seem to suggest she had a close working relationship with several Chinese government officials.

  • December 03, 2025

    Cities, Groups Fight Changes To HUD Homeless Housing Grant

    The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development unlawfully introduced "drastic" changes to grants under a federal program to combat homelessness, a coalition of local governments and homelessness service providers has alleged in a suit filed in Rhode Island federal court.

  • December 03, 2025

    Monitor Will Stay In Place In $1B Broad Street Fraud Case

    A private equity firm accused by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission of defrauding investors in a $1 billion fund lost its bid Wednesday to discharge the court-appointed monitor overseeing its books when a Florida federal judge rejected arguments that the monitor was acting in bad faith.

  • December 03, 2025

    UMB Bank Gets Partial Win In $80M Hard Rock Hotel Dispute

    UMB Bank NA has been granted wins on some of its claims in a suit regarding a failed $80 million Hard Rock Hotel development project, with a Kansas federal court ruling that claims it did not properly reimburse the project developer's costs have already been decided in Minnesota court.

  • December 03, 2025

    Landlord Can't Nix $4M Jury Award Over Mugging, Shooting

    A Florida appeals panel on Wednesday affirmed a $4 million judgment in favor of a renter who alleged that his landlord failed to protect him from a mugging in which he was shot four times, finding that the issue of whether the incident was foreseeable was properly put in front of a jury.

  • December 03, 2025

    Okla. Cos. Hit Simon Property Group With Antitrust Suit

    A group of Oklahoma-based companies accused retail-focused real estate investment trust Simon Property Group Inc. of waging "an anticompetitive campaign" to take down their competing mixed-use project in Oklahoma City.

  • December 03, 2025

    K&L Gates Deepens Its CMBS Servicer Attorney Bench

    K&L Gates LLP announced Wednesday that it has brought on two experienced real estate finance attorneys whose practices focus on advising commercial mortgage-backed securities servicers.

  • December 03, 2025

    Judge Halts Suit Over Texas Law Blocking Foreign Land Buys

    A Texas federal judge sided with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in pausing a lawsuit from three Chinese nationals pending a Fifth Circuit decision in a parallel challenge to a policy preventing citizens of China, North Korea, Iran and Russia from buying land in the state.

  • December 03, 2025

    Ore. Homeowner Can't Appeal Home's Value, Court Says

    An Oregon homeowner cannot appeal the real market values of his home because the difference between the homeowner's and the assessor's valuations failed to meet the statutory requirement for an appeal, the Oregon Tax Court ruled. 

  • December 03, 2025

    MVP: Sullivan & Cromwell's Ralston Turbeville

    Ralston Turbeville, a partner in Sullivan & Cromwell's real estate practice, guided Tishman Speyer's $3.5 billion refinancing of Rockefeller Center as well as the company's $2.85 billion refinancing of the Spiral in Hudson Yards, earning him a spot as one of the 2025 Law360 Real Estate MVPs.

  • December 03, 2025

    Walker & Dunlop Lines Up $153M Multifamily Refi Deal

    Walker & Dunlop Inc. has procured $153.3 million worth of refinancing loans for 876 luxury apartments located across "three garden style multifamily properties" in North Carolina, Florida and Louisiana, the commercial real estate financier announced Tuesday.

  • December 03, 2025

    Greystar Reaches $24M Deal With Gov't In 'Hidden' Fees Suit

    The major multifamily landlord Greystar, along with the Federal Trade Commission and the state of Colorado, asked a federal court to approve their $24 million settlement to end a lawsuit alleging the company wrongfully charged tenants "hidden" fees.

Expert Analysis

  • NC Banking Brief: All The Notable Legal Updates In Q3

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    There were several impactful changes to the financial services landscape in North Carolina in the third quarter of the year, including statutory updates, enforcement developments from Office of the Commissioner of Banks, and notable mergers, acquisitions and branch expansions, say attorneys at Moore & Van Allen.

  • Looking Beyond Property Damages For Wildfire Survivors

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    Personal injury attorneys seeking compensation for victims of wildfires like those in Los Angeles County must carefully apply a multidisciplinary approach that looks beyond obvious property loss to the full spectrum of damages, considering factors like emotional distress, disruption of community and the psychological toll of displacement, says Farid Yaghoubtil at Downtown L.A. Law Group.

  • Calif. Banking Brief: All The Notable Legal Updates In Q3

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    The third quarter of 2025 brought legislative changes to state money transmission certification requirements and securities law obligations, as well as high-profile accounting and anti-money laundering compliance enforcement actions by the Department of Financial Protection and Innovation, say attorneys at Ropes & Gray.

  • A Mortgage Lender's Guide To State Licensing Overhaul

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    Recent changes to the Conference of State Bank Supervisors' Nationwide Mortgage Licensing System require careful attention and planning from mortgage lenders, including tweaks to remote work designations and individual disclosure questions, says Allison Schilz at Mitchell Sandler.

  • Montana Federal Ruling Takes Broad View Of 'Related Claims'

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    A Montana federal court recently took a broad view of related claims, ruling that claims brought by different plaintiffs in different states alleging different legal theories were nevertheless under a directors and officers insurance policy, illustrating the range of interpretations courts may give these clauses, say attorneys at Hunton.

  • Expect DOJ To Repeat 4 Themes From 2024's FCPA Trials

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    As two upcoming Foreign Corrupt Practice Act trials approach, defense counsel should anticipate the U.S. Department of Justice to revive several of the same themes prosecutors leaned on in trials last year to motivate jurors to convict, and build counternarratives to neutralize these arguments, says James Koukios at MoFo.

  • As Student Loan Outlook Dims, What Happens To The Banks?

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    While much of the news around the student loan crisis focuses on the direct impact on young Americans' decreasing credit scores, the fate of the banks themselves — and the effect on banking policy — has been largely left out of the narrative, says Madeline Thieschafer at Fredrikson & Byron.

  • 5 Real Estate Takeaways From Trump's Sweeping Tax Law

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    Changes to the Internal Revenue Code included in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act will have a range of effects on real estate sponsors, investors and real estate investment trusts — from more compliance flexibility around taxable REIT subsidiary limits to new considerations raised by a key retaliatory tax provision that was left out, say attorneys at DLA Piper.

  • How Prohibiting Trigger Leads May Affect Mortgage Marketing

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    Recent amendments to the Fair Credit Reporting Act prohibiting the sale of trigger leads mark a significant shift in the regulatory landscape for mortgage lenders, third-party lead generators and their legal counsel, who should reevaluate lead generation strategies and compliance protocols, say Joel Herberman, Rob Robilliard and Leah Dempsey at Brownstein Hyatt.

  • Considerations For Cos. Amid Wave Of CFPB Vacatur Bids

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    As some entities look to vacate prior voluntary agreements with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, there are several considerations companies should take into account before seeking to vacate their settlements in the current legal and regulatory environment, says Jasmine Jean-Louis at Goodwin.

  • Rebutting Price Impact In Securities Class Actions

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    Defendants litigating securities cases historically faced long odds in defeating class certification, but that paradigm has recently begun to shift, with recent cases ushering in a more searching analysis of price impact and changing the evidence courts can consider at the class certification stage, say attorneys at Katten.

  • NY Laundering Ruling Leans On Jurisdictional Fundamentals

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    A New York appeals court’s recent dismissal of Zhakiyanov v. Ogai, a civil money laundering dispute between Kazakh citizens involving New York real estate, points toward limitations on the jurisdictional reach of state courts and suggests that similar claims will be subject to a searching forum analysis, say attorneys at Curtis Mallet-Prevost.

  • The Consequences Of OCC's Pivot On Disparate Impact

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    The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's recent move to stop scrutinizing facially neutral lending policies that disproportionately affect a protected group reflects the administration's ongoing shift in assessing discrimination, though this change may not be enough to dissuade claims by states or private plaintiffs, says Travis Nelson at Polsinelli.