CHICAGO, Oct. 25 /PRNewswire/ -- Banyan Strategic Realty Trust
(Nasdaq: BSRTS) today announced that its Board of Trustees has authorized the
negotiation of a contract with a potential purchaser of all of the Trust's
real estate assets. In February of 2000, Banyan formed a financial advisory
committee to evaluate strategic alternatives. As part of this process, the
committee retained CFC Advisory Services Limited Partnership, an affiliate of
Chicago-based Cohen Financial, to value Banyan's real estate assets and to
assist the committee in identifying and executing strategies that the Board
believes will maximize value while enhancing shareholder liquidity.
As previously disclosed, CFC completed its strategic analysis of the
portfolio and was subsequently authorized by the committee to market the
Trust's real estate portfolio to persons or entities interested primarily in
buying the Trust's properties in whole or in part. The Trust received and
evaluated a number of proposals from prospective purchasers. After further
discussions with CFC, and upon CFC's recommendation, the committee concluded
that shareholder value and liquidity could be best maximized and enhanced by
selling all of the Trust's real estate assets in a bulk transaction to a
single buyer, rather than individually or in discreet groups over an extended
period of time.
If the Trust is successful in negotiating and completing a sale of its
real estate assets, which it hopes to achieve by the end of the first calendar
quarter of 2001, the Trust expects to distribute the net proceeds to its
shareholders and to ultimately terminate the Trust pursuant to a plan of
liquidation. The committee estimates that based on the price indicated in the
proposal it has elected to pursue, and after paying or reserving for all known
liabilities and the projected costs of winding up the Trust, the net proceeds
available to shareholders would be approximately $6.20 per share. Although
the Trust is in the process of negotiating a contract, there is no assurance
that a contract or a transaction will be concluded or that the Trust will
realize the net proceeds per share estimated above.
The committee noted that a sale of the Trust's real estate assets in bulk
will, in its view, reflect a discount that it believes is reasonable from that
which may be achieved by selling the assets individually in a series of
transactions after taking into account the risks and costs inherent in
marketing the properties over an extended period of time.
The net proceeds that would be available for distribution to shareholders
after paying or providing for all of the Trust's liabilities, including the
cost of terminating the Trust, the tax treatment of these distributions and
the Trust's future financial statement presentation, will depend on a number
of factors. These factors include the gross selling price of the assets, the
timing of the adoption of a plan of liquidation, the time it takes to close a
sale and the costs associated with a sale and winding up of the Trust. As a
part of the process, the Trust intends to evaluate and determine the amount
and frequency of shareholder distributions during the coming months. The
Trust also confirmed its 12 cent per share third quarter distribution
announcement of October 16, 2000.
Banyan Strategic Realty Trust is an equity Real Estate Investment Trust
(REIT) that owns primarily office and flex/industrial properties. These
properties are located in certain major metropolitan areas of the Midwest and
Southeastern United States, including Atlanta, Georgia and Chicago, Illinois
and smaller markets such as Huntsville, Alabama, Louisville, Kentucky,
Memphis, Tennessee, and Orlando, Florida. The Trust's current portfolio
consists of 27 properties totaling 3.5 million rentable square feet. As of
this date, the Trust has 14,238,161 shares of beneficial interest outstanding.
Except for the historical information contained herein, certain matters
discussed in this release are forward-looking statements, the achievement of
which involve risks and uncertainties that are detailed from time to time in
our reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including the
report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 1999. The "Management's
Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations"
section was included in our Form 10-Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2000
which was filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on August 14,
2000. Without limitation the foregoing words such as "anticipates",
"expects", "intends", "plans", and similar expressions are intended to
identify forward-looking statements.
See Banyan's Website at http://www.banyanreit.com.
For further information regarding Banyan free of charge via fax, dial
1-800-PRO-INFO and enter BSRTS.
SOURCE Banyan Strategic Realty Trust
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Related links:
http://www.banyanreit.com
CONTACT:
Robert G. Higgins, Vice President, General
Counsel, 312-683-5539, or Karen Dickelman, Investor Relations,
312-683-3671, email, ir@banyanreit.com, both of Banyan Strategic
Realty Trust
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