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Maguire Sells Trophy OC Tower, WaMu Campus in Doubt

Los Angeles-based Maguire Properties Inc. said Monday it sold its trophy office property in Orange County, Irvine’s 3161 Michelson tower, to the Emmes Group of Cos., a privately owned real estate investment company based in New York.

The price for the 531,000-square-foot tower, which opened at Maguire’s Park Place campus in 2007, is about $160 million, or $301 per square foot.

That price is about 40% below the building’s construction cost, but still ranks as the biggest OC office sale seen in close to two years.

Maguire also announced on Monday it was negotiating with lenders in anticipation of a default on a loan tied to another Irvine property it has a stake in, the former Washington Mutual office campus.

Maguire has a 20% interest in the venture that owns the multibuilding property at the corner of Main Street and Von Karman Avenue, which now goes under the name Quintana. A unit of Australia’s Macquarie Group Ltd. owns the remainder of the 566,000-square-foot campus.

Neither developments announced Monday by troubled landlord Maguire is unexpected.

The Business Journal reported in April that a sale to Emmes was in the works, with sources at the time putting the sales price close to $165 million.

Privately-owned Emmes started operations in 1992, buying distressed debt from insolvent financial institutions. The 3161 Michelson tower appears to be its only West Coast property.

The Quintana campus has only been about 40% occupied since March, after leases to defunct lender Washington Mutual were rejected by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., acting as a receiver for the failed savings and loan.

One office building at the campus, opened about two years ago, has yet to land a tenant.

The Quintana campus has $106 million in mortgage-bond financing covering the property, which is due to mature at the end of 2011, according to Maguire.

Maguire and Macquarie have determined that the best outcome for the two companies is to commence discussions with the special servicer of the mortgage bonds, rather than continuing further capital funding at Quintana, the company said in a statement.

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Mark Mueller
Mark Mueller
Mark is the Editor-in-Chief of the Orange County Business Journal, one of the premier regional business newspapers in the country. He’s the fifth person to hold the editor’s position in the paper’s long history. He oversees a staff of about 15 people. The OCBJ is considered a must-read for area business executives. The print edition of the paper is the primary source of local news for most of the Business Journal’s subscribers, which includes most of OC’s major corporate and community players. Mark’s been with the paper since 2005, and long served as the real estate reporter for the paper, breaking hundreds of commercial and residential real estate stories. He took on the editor’s position in 2018.
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