Karen W. Kramer
Ms. Kramer practice involves representing for-profit and nonprofit developers, owners and lenders in connection with a range of multifamily affordable housing programs and transactions. She routinely represents buyers and sellers in structuring transactions and obtaining required federal regulatory approvals to transfer subsidized and use-restricted properties.
Ms. Kramer has extensive experience with HUD’s 236 decoupling program and has advised for-profit and nonprofit developers across the country in structuring and closing complicated transactions involving multiple subsidy and funding sources including low income housing tax credits, tax exempt bonds, and HOME funds.
Ms. Kramer has represented lenders in FHA-insured closings and has represented borrowers on 202 prepayments and in obtaining HUD approval for a Transfer of Physical Assets (TPA). Ms. Kramer also routinely provides advice on all aspects of the project-based and tenant-based Section 8 programs, including enhanced vouchers and project based vouchers. She has worked with clients on a range of issues in the Section 8 Mark-to-Market and Mark-up-to-Market programs.
Representative Transactions include:
- Represented Housing Authority in the acquisition and decoupling of a multifamily project, including obtaining project based vouchers for a majority of units, transferring the existing project based Section 8 Contract on a minority of units, and obtaining new financing involving low income housing tax credits, tax exempt bonds, and HOME funds.
- Represented a large public agency in connection with program to decouple, refinance and preserve a portfolio of Section 236 properties.
- Closed a transaction involving transfer of a 264 unit project originally preserved under ELIHPA, including decoupling of the IRP subsidy, assignment of the Section 8 Contract, and a defeasance of the subordinate federally insured loan until the prepayment lockout expired.
Prior to joining the firm in October 2002, Ms. Kramer practiced law for seven years with the Washington, D.C. law firm Covington & Burling. At Covington, her broad commercial real estate practice included counseling clients in acquisitions and dispositions of commercial office, multifamily, and farm properties as well as financings, construction, leasing, and zoning matters. Her first years of practice also included experience with all facets of civil litigation, including fair housing.
Ms. Kramer received her A.B. from Princeton University in 1990 where she majored in the Woodrow Wilson School of Public & International Affairs and her J.D. in 1995, with highest honors, from The George Washington University Law School where she was a member of the Law Review and was elected to the Order of the Coif. Ms. Kramer is admitted to the Bars of the District of Columbia, Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
