Another pair of blues are singing the blues -- Connecticut and its capitol Hartford -- over debt woes. Connecticut has the most millionaires per acre of any state. After the new tax laws, that may change.
"Desperate times call for desperate measures. But are Connecticut and its capital, Hartford, desperate enough to sell and lease back their properties and guarantee the buyer a hefty return?
A Chicago-based private equity real estate firm is offering as much as $2 billion to purchase office buildings, health-care facilities, transit-related properties and whatever the governments think they can sell, so long as the buyer gets a 7.25 percent initial return, plus annual rent hikes of 1.5 percent. The offer by Oak Street Real Estate Capital LLC, detailed in letters of intent delivered Wednesday, leaves the choice of what properties to include up to the governments.
Connecticut and its distressed capital city surely could use the money. The state’s government has been wrestling with an underfunded pension system and chronic budget deficits, in part because the national economic recovery has passed much of Connecticut by, leaving it with fewer jobs than it had a decade ago. Hartford is even worse: The capital avoided bankruptcy last year only because of a bailout by the state.
More at: https://www.bloomberg.com/news...r-to-buy-real-estate
Connecticut has the highest net tax supported debt per capita of any US State, all of which are blue.
Source: Moody’s Investor’s Service
Connecticut has the second worst credit rating AA- . An honor it shares with five other states (three red and three blue). Only blue Illinois, has a lower rating of BBB-.