Every engagement follows the same rigorous process, from intake to written findings or negotiated outcome.
Engagement Method
Engagement Intake
We schedule a scoping call with the engaging partner, director, principal, or fiduciary. We confirm the transaction or the situation, the questions to be answered, the deliverable, and the timeline.
Conflicts (before scope)
Possible conflicts are checked before any further conversation. We do not accept files where we have a current or recent engagement with a party to the transaction, a counterparty, or a sponsor. If a conflict surfaces mid-engagement, we disclose immediately and stand down.
Scope Letter
We issue a scope letter defining the transaction or situation and documents in scope, jurisdictions, source categories, deliverable, timeline, fee structure, and confidentiality terms.
Engagement Letter and Retainer
Engagement letter executed and retainer received before work begins. No work begins before papers are signed and money is in the account.
Examination or Resolution
For an examination: the contract, the title, the survey, zoning and entitlements, leases, and the underwriting assumptions, worked to the scope and only to the scope. For a contested situation: the ownership, the votes, the documents, and the real interests, mapped and negotiated to an outcome. Findings are documented throughout.
Deliverable
Written findings delivered to the engaging party in the format defined in the scope letter, or the negotiated agreement that moves the deal, with the supporting record.
The Principal
As a broker, Benoit has sat on both sides of a transaction and learned where the leverage hides and how hard each side is pulled toward the one outcome that pays them, the closing. His outcome with Meridian is a different one. He makes sure consultants, accountants, attorneys, principals, and fiduciaries are clear-eyed about what the data actually implies, and when a situation is stuck, he negotiates it loose. He finds what others miss, uncovers what a deal contains, analyzes what it means, and reports it plainly. The truth about the deal, unvarnished, no agenda.
Benoit Lapointe. Principal and Broker of Meridian Strategic Advisors, Inc. Five years at RBC Dominion Securities in Toronto serving high-net-worth and corporate clients. Bilingual English and French. Dual United States and Canada citizenship. Business Administration and Political Science, Universite de Sherbrooke. The California broker license is the credential at the center of the practice.
Services
Forensic Due Diligence
Independent forensic examination of a real estate or business-opportunity transaction in full, before it closes and after it has closed. After the close, we reconstruct what a transaction contained for disputes, audits, restatements, second opinions, and litigation support. Before the close, we read a live deal in full before anyone commits.
Case Study: Prohibited Land Use Marketed As A Viable Development Project
Case Study: He Did Not Own The Building He Was Trying To Sell
Negotiation and Conflict Resolution
A full discipline of the practice, equal in weight to the diligence work. Where a transaction is contested, deadlocked, or frozen, we map the ownership, the documents, the votes, and the real interests, find the leverage others miss, and negotiate the path to an outcome. For deadlocked co-owners, fractured or inherited ownership, partnership and family stalemates, and stalled high-value deals.
Case Study: The Decisive Vote Was Not the Biggest Owner
Commercial Real Estate Consulting
Advisory work for firms and principals that lack senior real estate transactional staff: title, environmental, zoning, entitlement, lease structure, valuation methodology, and the deal economics beyond the standard forensic toolkit.
Case Study: Lease Renewal Not Tested Against The Market
Selective Engagements
Off-mandate real estate work for principals and family offices when the question fits, the people fit, and discretion is the point. Sourced through referral only.