Question concerning joint venture term sheet in MF land deal
Usually my buyers send an LOI, we work on a PSA, and then close a land deal like 78 years later, mostly dealing with publicly traded builders or larger private development shops. 

Was working with a new buyer and getting the details worked out for an LOI... then I receive today a joint venture agreement term sheet instead. 

I get what this is: they want the seller to contribute the parcels as an equity contribution. Great.

The thing is, in addition to this coming out of left-field (we never mentioned the seller was interested in a JV, and he won't be) there is nothing about preferred returns, what kinds of distribution split will take place, nothing about promotes, etc, just the purchase price offer.

Are they actually looking for a joint venture deal or is this just some kind of formality using the JV language? Why the lack of details?

Why surprise us with this at the last second?
[{"id": "hrtqexi", "text": "Odd to surprise at the last second like that... when we submit JV term sheets for deals like this we always include the standard pref return hurdles as a starting point to negotiate but we never surprise our sellers with these offers lol", "replies": [{"id": "hrvfpoh", "text": "Yeah, it's a strange one for sure.", "replies": [], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}]