Daniel Cole

He serves as Senior Counsel in the Commercial Practice Group at Handler Thayer, LLP. While Mr. Cole has advised clients with respect to a wide variety of complex transactional matters, the primary focus has been real estate, development, joint venture structuring, and related tax planning.

Mr. Cole has structured and closed over $1.6B of joint venture transactions, including both “one-off” and programmatic joint ventures.  He also has extensive experience with respect to various capitalization transactions, including debt and equity workouts, and restructuring and/or foreclosing on a variety of debt and equity investments.

Mr. Cole has also represented real estate investment trusts with respect to a number of REIT transactions and issues, including mergers and acquisitions; REIT status issues (i.e. prohibited transactions/broker-dealer activity); property acquisitions and dispositions, development, UPREIT transactions; and complex tax structuring, including tax deferral through issuance of REIT operating partnership units, and forward and reverse like-kind exchanges.  He has counseled hotel owners and operators with respect to hospitality related matters, including new construction and renovation projects; acquisition and disposition of hospitality and mixed-use projects; negotiation of franchise and management agreements; and restructuring of  development and operating obligations with equity providers, lenders, and hotel franchisors.

Mr. Cole’s experience also includes advising and counseling clients with respect to:
• Private placement offerings, private equity transactions, debt offerings, fund formation, securities matters, partnership roll-ups, and asset and stock purchase agreements
• Acquisition, disposition, development, and finance of a variety of real estate projects, including office, retail, regional shopping centers, apartments, condominiums, parking garages, industrial, hospitality and mixed-use projects
• Purchase and sale of distressed assets, including secured and unsecured loans, real estate, and companies
• Secured and unsecured financing, mezzanine financing, participations, construction and permanent loans on behalf of borrowers and lenders
• Office and retail lease agreements on behalf of landlords and tenants, including “one-off” leases as well as development and execution of programmatic office leasing strategy
• Negotiation of various development-related agreements, including Development Agreements CCRs, REAs, as well as Contractor, Architect, and Construction management agreements
• Planning, entitlements, zoning and development issues on behalf of municipalities and developers

Mr. Cole earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Accountancy from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, as well as a Juris Doctorate degree from the University of Illinois College of Law, where he was a member of the Law Review. 

In addition, he is a Certified Public Accountant and is a Licensed Real Estate Broker in the State of Illinois.