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The Rise of Sustainable Building: Demand for Eco-Friendly Properties and the Related Legal Considerations
By Amelia Sanchez and Ulrick Matsunaga
SAN DIEGO (April 24, 2026) – Although the U.S. government continues to roll back sustainability regulations – most recently finalizing the rescission of the Greenhouse Gas endangerment finding, a landmark deregulatory action that removes the legal basis for federal greenhouse gas (GHG) emission standards – market momentum toward high-performance, energy-efficient commercial real estate remains robust.
For multiple reasons, sustainability has become a defining driver of long-term value in commercial real estate – with investors increasingly factoring sustainability scores into property valuations, lenders pricing loans based on building performance metrics, and tenants paying documented premiums for green-certified space.
While this growth is driven by environmental objectives, legal obligations, investor expectations, and evolving regulatory frameworks also come into play. Accordingly, developers and their counsel should carefully evaluate sustainability investments within the context of applicable regulatory frameworks and ensure that projections regarding environmental or financial performance are appropriately qualified.
CGS3 partner Amelia Sanchez and attorney Ulrick Matsunaga – both core members of our sustainability and renewable energy practice group – recently wrote about the demand for eco-friendly properties and the related legal considerations in a recent article published in Law360.
The full article can be read here (subscriber only).
About Crosbie Gliner Schiffman Southard & Swanson LLP (CGS3)
CGS3 is a recognized leader among a new generation of commercial real estate law firms with practice areas covering the entire commercial real estate life cycle, including finance, acquisition/disposition, entity formation, tax, construction & development, land use, leasing, distressed asset workouts and dispute resolution. Earning a reputation as one of California’s leading commercial real estate law firms, CGS3 recruits some of the state’s top real estate attorneys from both large corporate firms and senior in-house positions. For more information, visit http://www.cgs3.com.