Jury Awards

Name of company

Smolarek, Rogala, Caban - Adwokaci i Radcowie Prawni

Department head or senior representative in Poland, real estate

Łukasz Caban - Attorney at Law, Partner

Department head or senior representative profile

Łukasz Caban specializes in real estate law and he's been involved in lease of over 1.4 mln sqm of commercial premises, including one of the biggest office leases in Poland in 2018 (12,000 sqm for Ringier Axell Springer Polska) and legal advice on hundreds of other projects, e.g. a precedent liquidation of agricultural and forest property investment funds, for which SRC received nominations for "Law Firm of the Year" in the 2019 and 2022 Eurobuild Awards and 2019-2023 CEE Investment Awards

Team description including the major achievements

SRC was founded in 2005, hires 15 people, mostly attorneys, and specializes in real estate advisory, assisting Clients in purchase, lease, construction and litigation on the office, retail, hotel, agricultural and industrial real estate market. SRC provided legal assistance in numerous transactions of real estate purchase, such as:
• purchase of 4 (four) office buildings of combined 120,000 (one hundred twenty thousand) square meters GLA by one Client in the years 2015 - 2017, one of which was the largest office building purchase transaction in Poland in 2016 (Konstruktorska Business Center), as well as advice in regards to financing the transaction
• acquisition of plots of land for shopping center construction by Ingka Holding
• sale and purchase of 6 (six) industrial parks for a foreign investment fund
• purchase of over 4,000 (four thousand) hectares of land from multiple owners for an agricultural project
• acquisition of over 300 hectares of land for nearly 100 solar energy and wind park projects in different parts of Poland, including share purchase agreements as well as land purchase agreements
The firm also has a track record of advisory for landlords and tenants in the lease transactions amounting to over 1.4 million square meters of commercial premises, including:
• advisory to the landlord, Cromwell Property Group, in one of the biggest lease transactions in the office market in Poland in 2019 (nearly 10,000 square meters for Pekao S.A. in Wiśniowy Business Park in Warsaw)
• advisory to the landlord, Cromwell Property Group, in one of the biggest lease transactions in the office market in Poland in 2018 (12,000 square meters for Ringier Axell Springer Polska on Domaniewska 49 in Warsaw)
• introduction to the Polish market of a fitness operator and a tenant of over 45,000 (forty five thousand) square meters of retail area
• lease agreements of buildings for an international Marriott brand hotel operator and other companies from hospitality business
• day-to-day legal assistance for over 20 (twenty) commercial real estate buildings in Poland
SRC also provides complex legal services for construction in commercial real estate market, i.a. construction and reconstruction of shopping centers, hotel buildings and fit-out works in office and retail premises, as well as full litigation assistance, including successful representation of a Client before Supreme Court that concluded in a precedent and often-quoted ruling that a land lease contract provision enabling the lessee to prolong the agreement over the period of 30 years in null and void.
SRC also assists Clients in less conventional real estate market projects, such as:
• long term lease agreements of land for factory and mining purposes
• liquidation of an investment fund investing in agricultural and forest property in the name of a foreign depositary bank
• purchase of property from Agricultural Property Agency and Special Economic Zone for the purpose of greenfield investment by an investor from the UK
• negotiation of hotel management agreements with Marriott for one of the biggest hotels of this chain in Poland and Czech Republic

Key current clients

Ingka Holding - World's largest furniture retailer and real estate investor; owner of IKEA concept; Cromwell Property Group - Australian Real Estate Investment Trust; Golden Star Estate B.V. - Dutch fund investing in commercial properties; Bregentved Estate - Danish company operating on agricultural and forest real properties; Nordic Solar Energy A/S - Danish fund investing in solar parks; Raiffeisen Bank International AG - Austrian investment bank; Hines - International Real Estate Holdings U.S

Participation in property sales and acquisitions between July 2022 and June 2023

• establishment of a legal title to a land under planned 340 MW photovoltaic farm for a renewable energy provider
• assistance to a foreign investment fund in sales of combined 950 ha of agricultural property and 368 ha of forest property
• assistance in purchase of 8 companies owning in total 20 photovoltaic farms with a total capacity of approximately 20 MW
• assistance in financing and refinancing transactions for the construction of 39 photovoltaic farms, located in northwestern and central Poland, with a total capacity of approximately 37 MW of power (SRC Law Firm earlier also advised on acquiring the farms)
• due diligence process before acquisition by agricultural producer of a group of 6 companies, owners of land, including due diligence of 900 ha of agricultural land located in Zachodniopomorskie province
• legal assistance in various stages of high-bay warehouse investment to a Scandinavian investor
• negotiating the terms and conditions of 2 sales agreements and 1 preliminary sales agreement of real properties designated for industrial parks, on the part of a Scandinavian seller
• negotiating the terms and conditions of 2 sales agreements and 1 preliminary sales agreement of the real properties designated for industrial parks, on the side of the seller, an international retailer
• legal assistance in sales of 195ha of farm land in the midst of a road placement decision
• negotiation and renegotiation, on behalf of an investment bank, of a preliminary agreement for the sale of 170 hectares of land for the opening of an aggregate mine
• advising a foreign commodity-trade company in the purchase of 18 ha of land, including a freight-trains unloading terminal

Total value of the transactions on which your company advised between July 2022 and June 2023 (in EUR)

EUR 195,000,000.00

Please say why the compamy should be considered for the award

SRC is proud to present other noteworthy achievements from the last 12 months:

• negotiations, on the side of the landlord, of the largest office lease agreement in Poland in Q4 2022 and one of the largest in the entire year 2022 (14,000 square meters for Lionbridge in Konstruktorska Business Center in Warsaw)
• legal advice to the landlord on financing agreements for the costs of fit-out works for the above tenant
• successful court representation of multiple clients in disputes with the Tax Authority regarding overpaid property tax, including taxation of production plants, buildings, land, structures and equipment of thermal power plants, transformers, cooling towers, technological installations, pipelines, cables and railroad infrastructure, flood barriers, bioreactors, fiber optic cables, telecommunication cables within a modern waste treatment plant, hotel buildings unused as a result of the restriction imposed by the state authorities on the performance of business activities in connection with the prevention of Covid – 19
• preparation of the agreement on usufruct of 500 ha of land for a PV farm owner
• negotiating the lease agreement, on the side of the tenant, for office premises of app. 6,000 sq m in an office building in Warsaw for 60 months for an advisory and research company
• agreeing the terms and conditions of the lease agreement of app. 1,100 ha of agricultural lands in Zachodniopomorskie province for the period until August 2035
• advising Ingka Centers in the investment process for "Ogrody Ulricha" in Wola Park shopping center in Warsaw
• representation of a green energy investor in proceedings before Office of Competition and Consumer Protection against Energy Regulatory Office
• assistance in shutting down of an old industrial park by a new owner, including preparation of all lease termination documents, in order to enable a new investment
• representation of the client, acting as a tenant, in beneficial settlement of a court case brought by the landlord, the owner of the land and building, for damage to the building where the client’s production plant was located
• successful court representation of a depositary bank, in several lawsuits in the name of SPVs of an investment fund for payment of rent from land and premises lease agreements
• successful Supreme Court representation of one of the leaders in the fertilizer and chemical industry in Europe in a case concerning taxation with property tax of land belonging to the client - part of plots of land on which the client carried out land reclamation work - which, according to the Tax Authority, were occupied for business activities and thus should be taxed as such property
• representation of a foreign real estate investor and hotel owner in a precedent multi-million-Euro court dispute against major insurer regarding damages for business interruption caused by Covid-19
• representing a foreign investor in the hotel and office industry in the processes of renovation, restoration and reconstruction of hotel and office buildings in Warsaw
• advising a foreign hotel owner in a dispute against a major hotel management company
• assistance in obtaining the building permit and concluding design contracts and agreements with the city for the new tower of one of the most recognizable office buildings in the center of Warsaw
• court representation of one of the major real estate investors in the world in the lawsuit for the conclusion of a contract for the sale of property on which a shopping center is located
• court representation of one of the major real estate investors in the world in the lawsuit for establishing the invalidity of the conclusion of an agreement to transfer, as security, the right of perpetual usufruct of property
• court representation of one of the major real estate investors in the world in the lawsuit for conclusion of the promised sales contract of property
• court representation of one of the major real estate investors in the world in the lawsuit for payment of contractual penalty for delay in conclusion of the promised sales contract of property
• court representation of a foreign depositary bank in a precedent case in Poland against the administrator of the remedial estate of an investment fund company, on behalf of the participants of the investment funds
• court representation of one of the leaders in the fertilizer and chemical industry in Europe, concerning the 2012-2018 statutory interest from overpaid property tax
• court representation of a car parts manufacturer against leading Polish energy trader in a case for reimbursement of energy sales fees unduly collected by the trader, in connection with malfunctioning of the metering and billing system resulting in overestimation of the reading of consumption of energy by the client's production plant
• preparation of a complaint and appeal in administrative proceedings concerning the authority’s refusal to grant a real estate developer conditions of development for the investment project of superstructuring a residential building in the centre of Warsaw
• legal / historical examination of the documentation of a property in Warsaw, located in government offices, courts and archives (including examination of archival books and journals from the early 20th century) with a view to indicating whether manufacturing activities were carried out on the property in the past
• day-to-day GDPR assistance to real estate companies
• negotiation and renegotiation of multiple lease agreements for retail/office and warehouse space
• negotiation and renegotiation of multiple construction/fit-out works contracts in shopping centers, office and warehouse buildings
• advising on leases and operation of shopping centers to both landlords and tenants, in particular related to energy limitations and disputes

Company website

www.srclaw.pl