GMAC Commercial Mortgage Corporation Provides $45 Million in Acquisition Financing for Birmingham's SouthTrust Tower.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- GMAC Commercial Mortgage Corporation (GMACCM) has provided $45 million in floating-rate, interim acquisition financing for a prominent Birmingham, Ala., office building.

The 30-story SouthTrust Tower is the tallest building in Birmingham and the current headquarters of SouthTrust, one of the South's major banks. The tower, located at 20th Street and Fifth Avenue, contains 511,039 square feet of rentable space. Major tenants in addition to SouthTrust Corporation, which has 40 percent of the space, include Burr & Forman, a major area law firm, with about 20 percent of the building, and Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz. Upon completion of the borrower's planned capital improvements, the SouthTrust Tower is expected to be the top office building in the downtown market.

Stephen R. McRae, vice president in the GMACCM Atlanta loan origination office arranged the transaction for Barry Real Estate Companies and Value Enhancement Fund V, a closed-end enhanced return real estate fund managed by VEF Advisors, LLC. Lance Patterson of First Fidelity Mortgage Corporation provided mortgage banking services on behalf of Barry Real Estate.

Barry Real Estate is a premier southeast acquisition and development company, and the SouthTrust Tower financing is GMACCM's first transaction with company principals, Harold V. "Hal" Barry and Christian B. Schoen.

"We followed this acquisition through a number of evolutions over the course of almost a year of negotiations between buyer and seller," said McRae. "There was fierce competition from several interim lenders, but GMACCM won the deal with a financing package that met all of the borrower's requirements for loan proceeds, pricing and structuring flexibility. Even a last-minute wrinkle - the announcement of Wachovia Corporation's intended purchase of SouthTrust - was mitigated by the transaction structure."

GMACCM structured the transaction around the impending rollover of two major-tenant leases and imposed a cash sweep to build a re-tenanting reserve after allowing for a preferential payment on the invested equity. This structure allowed GMACCM to fund up to 80 percent of the initial acquisition costs and included an additional commitment to cover future leasing costs.

According to John M. Beam, senior vice president and branch manager for GMACCM's Atlanta office, "Barry Real Estate has an enviable track record. The SouthTrust Tower is their second office building in downtown Birmingham, joining the already successful project, One Federal Place. Based on their experience in this and other southeastern markets, we have a high level of confidence that Hal, Chris and their team can achieve long-term stabilization of this high-quality asset."

GMAC Commercial Mortgage Corporation (GMACCM), a wholly-owned subsidiary of GMAC Commercial Holding Corp., is a premier financial services firm with extensive funding sources that, coupled with a broad menu of innovative financing programs, serve the needs of borrowers of commercial real estate debt as well as the providers of such capital. GMACCM is an industry leader in loan origination, servicing, asset management, investment management and technology services. The diverse lending and servicing specialist and its affiliates have more than 100 offices worldwide. GMACCM has a servicing portfolio of more than $241 billion and provides a variety of financing products and services including permanent, interim, mezzanine and construction lending as well as equity capital for commercial real estate. GMACCM has specialized lending units focused on healthcare, hospitality and franchise and asset backed lending.

News releases and other information about GMACCM, its products and services are available at www.gmaccm.com.

Property photo available upon request.