Overview
Michael Bradford is of counsel in the Real Estate practice of Paul Hastings and is based in the firm’s Orange County office. For the past seventeen years, Michael’s practice has been dedicated to representing real estate development companies, owners and operators in connection with the development of luxury hotel, resort, mixed-use resort, condo-hotel, fractional interest, timeshare, condominium, club, and other similar projects throughout the world. He also focuses his practice in structuring large, complex, mixed-use, and multi-component projects including creation of the legal structure, subdivision, governing bodies and associations, budgets, rental programs, and legal documentation. He has been instrumental in creating numerous projects using vertical, airspace subdivisions to efficiently subdivide the projects to maximize flexibility and project value, optimize developer control, and provide for the best operational environment.
When residential products are involved, Michael has created structures that accomplish all of the foregoing while balancing the interest of residential owners. In fact, in California, he has spent extensive time discussing and working with the heads of the subdivision departments from the Sacramento and Los Angeles offices of the California Department of Real Estate (DRE) to create structures and documents that are optimal for developers and commercial owners but also are sufficient and acceptable to the DRE from a residential perspective. Michael also has extensive experience in all residential aspects of the mixed-use projects including timeshare, fractional, club, condominium, and condo-hotel. He has worked on the sale of major national timeshare companies as well as single site timeshare and condominium projects. Michael also has extensive experience in the registration of timeshare, fractional interest, condominium, and other common interest development projects with federal and state regulatory agencies, registering extensively in California and in every other major state that has registration requirements.
Education
- J.D., cum laude, from Loyola Law School in 1999. In law school he was in the Order of the Coif and a member of the St. Thomas More Honor Society.
- B.S., from University of California at Los Angeles in 1985.
Representations
- Related, Grand Avenue: represent the developer in the creation of the overall project structure for a large horizontal and vertical mixed-use development, which includes hotel, retail, multi-family housing, public spaces, and subterranean garage, located in downtown Los Angeles along the Grand Park corridor.
- Four Seasons Residences – Los Angeles: represent Wetherly Portfolio, LLC, the developer of an ultra-luxury residential condominium project in Los Angeles, California, to be a Four Seasons branded residential project. Created the project structure and drafted the condominium declaration and all other project and residential documentation as well as all residential sales documentation and DRE registration materials.
- The Witkoff Group: represent the developer in the creation of the overall project structure for a mixed-use luxury resort hotel and residential condominium project located on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, California, to be branded with Marriott’s luxury "Edition" brand. This project uses a vertical subdivision, creating airspace parcels to isolate the residential component into a separate parcel from the hotel and other commercial components. Created the structure and drafted the master declaration, condominium declaration, and all of the project documentation and residential documentation and DRE registration materials.
- Combined Properties, Incorporated: represent the developer in the creation of the overall project structure for a mixed-use luxury resort hotel and residential condominium project located on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, California, to be branded with Montage’s luxury "Pendry" brand. This project uses a vertical subdivision, creating airspace parcels to maintain control over and separation of the residential, affordable, hotel, retail, and parking components. Created the structure and drafted the master declaration, condominium declaration, and all other project documentation and residential documentation and DRE registration materials.
- Related, Santa Clara: represent the developer in the creation of the overall project structure for a large horizontal and vertical mixed-use development, which includes several office towers, retail components, cinema, restaurants, hotels, multi-family housing, parking structures, market, as well roadways, walkways, and other open and common spaces. This project uses a horizontal and vertical subdivision to create parcels for all of the major components. This project is also subject to a ground lease and subleases. Created the structure and drafted the Master Declaration governing the project.
- LinkedIn – SyWest Mountain View Joint Development: represent the developer in the creation of the overall structure for Linkedin’s main campus, which includes several office buildings, hotel, theater, athletic fitness center, parking, retail, central plant, and various common areas. This property is owned in a very complicated structure involving one or more ground leases and several sub-leases, all subject to a leasehold reciprocal easement Agreement. This project uses a horizontal and vertical subdivision to create parcels for all of the major components. Drafted the Reciprocal Easement Agreement governing the project.
- Baha Mar Ltd.: represent the developer in the creation of the master project structure for a complex mixed-use resort project containing several luxury hotels, several luxury residential condominium regimes, major convention center, large casino, retail, golf, and various other components of Baha Mar's $3.5 billion resort project. This project used both a horizontal and vertical subdivision scheme to create separate parcels for each of the hotels and other major components and, within the hotel parcels, to create airspace parcels to separate the hotel, casino, convention, and retail operations from the residential components. Created the structure and drafted the master declaration, several condominium declarations, and all other project documentation and residential documentation and also created the rental program.
- Cosmopolitan Hotel Las Vegas: represent Deutsche Bank after it took title to the partially completed project and act as developer finishing the project. This project has a multi-story podium base that houses the casino, subterranean parking, retail, restaurants, spa, theaters, and other components. The surface of the podium contains pools, recreational facilities and two massive residential towers. Each tower is subject to a condominium declaration. This project uses a vertical subdivision to create airspace parcels for all of the various parcels in the podium and the two hotel towers. The hotel towers are subdivided into separate condominium regimes. Created the master structure and drafted the reciprocal easement agreement that ties all components together and governs the project.
- Four Seasons Jackson Hole: represent Luis Dreyfus, the developer of a large mixed-use resort project including a hotel, residential condominium, and fractional components all in the same building. This project is the first master declaration ever drafted for all three of these components under the same roof. Drafted the master declaration tying all the components together and governing the project as well as separate condominium and timeshare sub-declarations and all other project and residential documentation and residential and timeshare registrations. This project used vertical subdivision to create airspace parcels for the hotel and residential components.
- Four Seasons Vail: represent the original developer of this project, which is very similar in structure and scope to the Four Season Jackson Hole.
- Wilshire Grand Los Angeles: Paul Hastings represented Korean Airlines in several aspects of the development of the tallest building west of the Mississippi River, including an Intercontinental Hotel, large meeting space, restaurant, office, retail, and other components. This project is designed and set up to be subdivided into vertical airspace parcels. Provided forms, advice, and review for the drafting of the reciprocal easement agreement governing the entire project.
- Represent dozens of buyers of mixed-use projects every year with respect to reviewing, analyzing, and spotting issues with respect to pre-existing mixed-use subdivision, condominium, and other common interest developments. This work provides great context and is invaluable in spotting pitfalls and issues to avoid and also in discovering new techniques to utilize when preparing original documents and structures for new developments.