Irvine-based Shopoff Realty Investments said it has received the green light to redevelop a former oil storage facility in Huntington Beach into a mixed-use site that will add 250 single-family homes, a hotel and other commercial and recreational amenities.
The approvals come nearly five years after Shopoff acquired Magnolia Tank Farm, a 29-acre site on Magnolia Street about a block from Pacific Coast Highway and 2 miles south of the Huntington Beach Pier.
“With city approvals secured, we are thrilled to be able to move this project forward, providing much needed housing in this supply constrained market, as well as neighborhood-focused retail and a boutique lodge that will differentiate itself from the other ocean adjacent hotel properties,” said Chief Executive and President Bill Shopoff in a statement.
$500M Project
Shopoff paid $26.5 million, or about $925,000 per acre, in 2016 for the site that held three large, above-ground oil tanks developed by Southern California Edison in the early 1970s.
The company said it demolished the tanks in 2017 and put together development plans that were approved by Huntington Beach’s planning commission in November 2019.
The new approvals from the Huntington Beach city council pave the way for construction to begin.
Early estimates pegged the cost of the development to be around $500 million.
Hotel Expansion
In addition to 250 single-family detached and attached homes, plans call for a 215-key hotel, marking further expansion into the hospitality sector for Shopoff.
The firm currently has one hotel in its portfolio: a 450-room property under development in Las Vegas.
Shopoff is working with Costa Mesa-based Contour Real Estate, a boutique development firm, for the roughly 500,000-square-foot hotel project called Dream Hotel Las Vegas.
The Surf City hotel is a 211,000-square-foot building described as a “boutique lodge.” The firm also has plans for a hotel in New Mexico, Shopoff told the Business Journal last year.
The Huntington Beach development will also include 19,000 square feet of retail, as well as public open space and trails throughout the project.
“This opportunity will enrich the City of Huntington Beach in many ways, at a time where unproductive land can be converted to provide many improvements and needed revenue,” said Vice President of Development James O’Malley.
