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Peter Benudiz is an accomplished real estate attorney and one of the foremost hospitality practitioners in the U.S.
Experience: Peter Benudiz is experienced in all legal disciplines critical to hospitality and real estate projects, and understands all forms of real estate, hospitality, and financings, including private equity deals, traditional construction and permanent loans, convertible and participating debt, mezzanine debt deals, securitizations and other hybrid real estate and corporate debt transactions. Mr. Benudiz also has a wide breadth of experience in negotiating and documenting highly complex workouts and restructurings involving hospitality assets and real estate secured debt, both inside and outside of the bankruptcy context. He has represented some of the world's largest financial institutions and private equity funds in connection with the financing, workouts and acquisitions of some of the most significant and well-known real estate and hotel projects.
Mr. Benudiz has been the lead lawyer on financings, acquisitions and dispositions of billions of dollars of real estate and hospitality assets, ranging from highly leveraged private equity deals in the hospitality world, as well as land assemblages, development of office projects, shopping centers, to the acquisitions, dispositions and financings of so-called "one-off" deals and portfolio transactions of five star luxury resorts, condo hotels, mixed use and master plan projects, golf courses and spas in the U.S. and abroad (with a particularly well recognized practice in Mexico). Mr. Benudiz coordinates and manages various real estate and hospitality related matters for some of the most sophisticated users of legal services -- including partnership and corporate securities issues, tax issues, workouts, bankruptcies and litigation, all aspects of traditional real estate and hospitality properties and recreational facilities, management agreements and franchise agreements.
Mr. Benudiz was also a teaching fellow at Harvard University Department of Government while attending Harvard Law School and has been a member of the UCLA Extension Program Faculty teaching Introductory Hotel Law. Mr. Benudiz is proficient in Spanish.
Education: University of California, Berkeley (A.B., Political Science, 1984); Harvard University Law School (J.D., 1987).
Admissions: California.
Recognition: Mr. Benudiz is consistently recognized as one of the leading hospitality lawyers in the United States. His hospitality practice is nationally ranked in Band 1 for Leisure & Hospitality in the reference guide, 2007 Chambers USA: America's Leading Lawyers for Business.
Memberships: International Society of Hospitality Consultants, State Bar of California; Los Angeles County Bar Association.
Publications:
"The Western Security Case: The Inevitable Next Step in California's Antideficiency Scheme," The Real Estate Finance Journal.
"The Hotel Acquisition Process," Urban Land.
"Interest in Luxury Hotels is Coming Back," The Real Estate Finance Journal.
"Hotel Lending: Opportunities and Legal Pitfalls," The Banking Law Journal.
"Hotel Lending: Chasing the Dream Into Reality," Hotel & Resort Industry.
"The Marriott Decision: Increasing a Hotel's Value with a Management Agreement Audit," The Real Estate Finance Journal.
"Now May be the Best Time in 20 Years to Lend on Hotels," The Interlawyer.
"Inn-Keeping and the Law: Management Agreement May be Subject to New Interpretation," Florida Hotel & Motel Journal.
"Past Hotel Industry Problems Present Opportunities for Savvy Lenders," The Real Estate Finance Journal.
"Hotel Lending in the 1990s: Amateurs Beware," Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Administration Quarterly, Winter (One of the 50 Most-Frequently Cited Articles in Cornell Quarterly).
"Acquisition as a Development Tactic," Hotel Development, Urban Land Institute.
"The Art of the Deal in Mexico" and "Is Mexico's Bust a Boon for U.S. Investors," Ideas & Trends, Hotel Online.
Speaking Engagements: Mr. Benudiz has been featured either as a lecturer, moderator or panelist at over 75 hospitality domestic and international investment conferences during the course of his career. The topics have ranged from cross-border transactions, hotel financings, restructurings, management agreements to joint venture and corporate structurings. | 