Further, make sure to appropriately weigh the value of a nation-wide logistics network capable of delivery and install for large appliances.
http://www.businessinsider.com/sears-service-department-is-in-shambles-customers-claim-2016-11
"For all of the problems with the Sears retail stores, both their real estate and brand assets represent a significant opportunity for $SHLD."
Tell that to Bruce Berkowitz, who is the second largest holder and has been going on for years about the real estate value of Sears, investing as high as over $150 per share. It is now $12 and has spun off a lot of mostly garbage. Lampert - whose term as the head of the company will go down as a case study-worthy disaster - neglected the hell out of the stores early on, instead doing buybacks as high as $170. When the financial engineering stopped working, Lampert has gone on and on about how they are having a turnaround; this is a delusional joke, made all the more laughable by the focus on "Shop Your Way", a membership program with no fee. The stores are awful.
"potential sale of the Kenmore, Craftsman, DieHard, and Sears Home Services brands."
And they'll just go through that cash in a blur if they do that. Lampert's horrendous performance at the top of Sears over the last few years has only soured it in the eyes of consumers, and the value of everything within has soured, as well. Selling Kenmore, Craftsman and other assets is not from a position of strength, it's a matter of buying more time for the financial engineering Frankenstein he's created, which continues to lose enormous amounts of money every day that it is open.
I'm not being harsh, it's just that the Sears bulls have been saying that it's a "real estate play" for nearly a decade now. And the results have been exceptionally awful. This thesis has just not played out. If it hasn't played out after nearly a decade after the stock has lost an enormous amount of value (and the spin-offs have been mostly garbage, including one that went ch 11), at some point people have to realize that they are going to be Sears bagholders.
"I'm going to take a contrasting view on this and say it all depends on the company's ability to monetize their existing assets. "
What assets? Inventory? The inventory cannot be that compelling. Tons of dated stores in shitty C/D-level malls? Some of the K-Marts are going to be abandoned. A number of the Sears stores are going to sit empty for years.
Some are already sitting abandoned. https://www.thestreet.com/story/12696012/1/16-pathetic-pictures-from-an-iconic-la-sears-store-thats-now-a-dump.html, http://www.businessinsider.com/photos-of-deserted-sears-stores-2015-12, http://weburbanist.com/2015/11/29/blue-lights-out-10-closed-abandoned-kmart-stores/, https://consumerist.com/2016/09/12/the-detroit-area-is-littered-with-abandoned-kmarts-but-thats-a-good-thing/
"Question: What could the Sears Roebuck Board of Directors have been thinking when, in 2005, they handed the company over to a hedge fund operator? Answer: They had no earthly idea what they were doing. Maybe they were just trying to rid themselves of their feckless CEO, Alan Lacy?
It’s now evident, that by the time the Sears Holdings coffin is lowered into the ground, the box will be almost empty. Lampert’s mismanaged initiatives have amounted to nothing more than a long running sell off of the company’s valuable body parts. First, to enrich himself, and then, more recently, to keep the enterprise alive. Valuable real estate – mostly gone. Intellectual property rights to Kenmore, Craftsman and Die Hard - gone. Free cash flow generated from normal ongoing operations, long gone. Cash flow, when there was any, reinvested in derivatives, rather than stores, people, products and marketing.
Whereas Alan Lacy had no clue how to manage Sears Roebuck’s performance, or, to position the company for the future, Lampert’s tenure falls into a category all by itself. Whether grossly incompetent, disingenuous, delusional or intellectually deficient, who knows? Read his shareholder letters and try to find a scintilla of realistic or rational thinking in what he has written and you come up completely short. Try to connect what he has written with real performance? Not possible.
Question: If you are one of the few who have aligned yourself with Lampert’s various investment theses over the past 11 years, what investment returns will you have earned? Answer: Maybe nothing. Think the remaining Sears Holdings real estate portfolio has significant value? Think again. Are there any buyers out there willing to pay a premium for large numbers of tired outmoded and poorly located stores? I don’t think so." (http://www.forbes.com/sites/markcohen/2016/02/29/sears-holdings-retailings-headless-horseman/#3d2c2e3fdeb9)
Eddie Lampert wanted to turn Sears into another Berkshire Hathaway. Instead, he has cratered a classic American brand in spectacular fashion, to the point where this should stand as a case study in financial engineering gone wrong in business books in the years ahead.
"I have heard various pundits and so-called industry experts say that the collapse of Sears was inevitable. That’s nonsense. Sears’ failure is a catastrophic failure of governance and leadership. The customer hasn’t walked away because Sears and Kmart were no longer brands they wanted to be associated with. They’ve walked away because Sears and Kmart have been grossly incapable of satisfying their needs and wants." (http://www.businessinsider.com/sears-obsession-with-wall-street-2016-3)