"Forming a joint venture with an engineering firm with the scope and scale of WSP's business, gives us the ability to look at our clients' investments, not just through the aspect of what financial re-engineering needs to be considered, but also the nuts and bolts of the engineering side, as well as the asset management side," he says.

Ultimately, Rosefky says the combined service platform provides a second chance at viability and subsequent profitability at challenged or problematic projects.

He says the questions coming from the firm's clients, primarily commercial or private equity lenders, include, "what do I have and how do I maintain the value and stabilize that value." Further, if the client so chooses, "how do I manage or dispose of the real estate I own?"

Currently, he says there are a number of things banks are doing to work through some of those questions, including note sales, foreclosures where they sue guarantors after the foreclosure, sitting on an asset and waiting for better times, or completing construction on busted projects.

But, Rosefsky says lenders are not developers, and, with the exception of those who are more well versed, "they don't necessarily want to be in the game of going in and hiring contractors to complete a construction project."

Rosefsky says the new firm can offer solutions to newly emerging challenges posed by the current market. For example, the firm is currently working on a partially constructed hotel project in what he calls "a very toney part of Manhattan."

Only the core shell of the structure is complete. The lender is asking what to do with the asset. "We're helping the client evaluate an alternative use that has significant construction, engineering and zoning risks."

"It's just too simple to say, we're going to convert it to residential without having any understanding of the costs and delays associated with that desired result," says Rosesky.