Target Return

Now, this isn't when the fake gold necklace didn't fit you and you returned it to Target.

A target return is a target investment return on some project that has a basic sense of predictability in its returns. Like...you'd never have a target return on a complex technology investment with commercial/retail applications. At the inception/investment stage, you'd have no idea whether this company would be Google or Shmoogle, the latter being way less effective as a search engine since it ended up being a laundry soap additive and is today worth $300. (Google at press time is kissing being worth a trillion dollars.)

But a target return can be applied to something like a skyscraper for a million square feet of office space in downtown Phoenix. The market is known. There are already lessors knocking on the door willing to commit, such that half the space is already spoken for in 6-12 year leases. Target returns on the investment in that building then is actually calculable and somewhat predictable, and thus can be taken seriously by lenders seeking big spreads in the debt they're all too happy to write...for the right price.