After failing to find construction financing, embattled CA Ventures and its investors walked away from a development site near the Chicago Bears’ potential new stadium in the northwest suburbs.First Bank Chicago seized approximately 3.5 acres of vacant land from an affiliate of Chicago-based CA Ventures through a deed in lieu of foreclosure last month, according to Cook County property records.The transaction marked the latest in a series of blunders for CA Ventures in the area just west of the former Arlington International Racecourse that Chicago’s NFL franchise purchased for $197 million in 2023 with a notion to build a new multi-billion dollar stadium and surrounding entertainment district.CA Ventures — which is also facing ongoing lawsuits from allegedly spurned investors and creditors related to a number of other projects — had grand ambitions in the surroundings neighboring the former racecourse site, where the Bears have demolished a grandstand in anticipation of stadium construction even as they flirt with staying in Chicago.The development site that CA Ventures handed back to First Bank Chicago is one of several where it planned or built big multifamily assets in recent years but had its investments fizzle out.CA Ventures CEO Tom Scott referred questions to Jeff Krol, who leads SC/CA Ventures, a firm that has raised money for numerous CA Ventures endeavors. Krol didn’t return a request for comment, and neither did First Bank Chicago.The giveback appears to satisfy a nearly $9 million mortgage loan the developer took out in 2022 on the property, which technically sits in the village of Rolling Meadows. It was likely intended as a bridge loan while the developer searched for construction financing and pursued entitlements and building permits from local authorities.Following fellow developer Rick Cavenaugh’s conversion of a shuttered Sheraton Hotel into a 214-unit multifamily property adjacent to the vacant land that First Bank Chicago now owns, CA Ventures built the neighboring 263-unit Payton Place apartment property.But lender TPG Real Estate Finance Trust last year seized that asset after CA Ventures defaulted on an $80 million loan that came due in 2023.Just to the east of Payton Place, CA Ventures was hit with a separate foreclosure complaint for over 2 acres of vacant land last year after allegedly defaulting on a nearly $4 million loan from Chicago-based Signature Bank; a judicial sale was conducted late last month with the lender likely to be confirmed as the winning bidder in coming days, according to a person familiar with the lawsuit.
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