NATIONWIDE REPLACEMENT PROPERTY SEARCH

The identification letter is a short document that does a lot of work, and in a Las Vegas market where good properties move quickly, the letter often has to be drafted before every candidate is fully settled. Getting the legal description and delivery timing right matters more than the letter looking polished, because a defective identification can unravel an otherwise well-run exchange.

Treat the letter as the output of a process, not the process itself. The real work happens in the weeks before it is drafted, confirming which candidates are real contenders and which should be dropped before they ever reach the page.

An identification is only valid if it unambiguously describes the property, which in practice means a full legal description or an address plus assessor's parcel number, not a broker listing sheet or a general area description. A letter that identifies "a retail center in Summerlin" without a specific parcel fails; a letter naming the exact address and APN of a specific building on West Charleston does not.

The same precision applies to multi-parcel deals. If a property spans two adjacent APNs, both need to appear on the letter, since an identification that only names one parcel can leave the other outside the exchange entirely.

Because Las Vegas multifamily and single-tenant net-lease product can go under contract within days of listing, the shortlist for identification should be built during the marketing period for the relinquished property, not after closing. That way, when day one of the 45-day window opens, the exchanger already knows which two or three candidates have survived initial diligence and can move straight to drafting the letter instead of starting the search from scratch.

Building that shortlist means having preliminary numbers, a T-12 and rent roll at minimum, on each candidate before the relinquished property even closes. Waiting until day one to start that homework wastes days that a competitive submarket will not give back.

Most Las Vegas exchangers use the three-property rule, naming up to three properties regardless of value, which works well when the exchanger has a short, high-conviction list. Investors casting a wider net across several submarkets, from Henderson multifamily to North Las Vegas industrial, sometimes need the 200% rule instead, which allows more than three properties as long as their combined value does not exceed 200% of the relinquished property's sale price.

Choosing between the two is worth deciding early, since it shapes how many candidates the sourcing effort needs to develop and how much diligence time each one realistically gets before day 45.

Before the letter goes out, confirm the following, ideally with enough lead time to fix any gap before the deadline arrives:

• the qualified intermediary's accepted delivery method and get a timestamped confirmation of receipt
• that delivery happens before midnight on calendar day 45, with no allowance for a late business day
• that each property's legal description matches title company records exactly
• that the counting rule chosen, three-property or 200%, is stated or implied consistently across every property listed
• that a backup candidate exists in case a named property falls out of contention during closing

An identification can be revoked or replaced in writing as long as the change is delivered to the qualified intermediary before midnight on day 45. After that point, the list is locked, which is why Las Vegas exchangers working against a competitive market should treat the days leading up to day 45 as a deadline for finalizing due diligence, not a deadline for starting it.

Exchangers sometimes assume they can quietly swap one property for another after the deadline if the first falls through. That is not correct; once day 45 passes, the exchanger is limited to whatever properties are already validly listed, which is precisely why a backup candidate belongs on the letter from the start.