A cofounder of apparel company Affliction Inc. has bought the Santa Ana building that holds the Observatory OC concert venue where he’s an investor, as well as an adjacent office.
The 25,400-square-foot building at 3503 S. Harbor Blvd. that holds the Observatory, plus a 47,319-square-foot office at 3501 S. Harbor, recently traded hands for about $10 million combined, or roughly $137 per square foot, according to property records.
Records show the buyer being OC Constellation LLC, an entity managed by Courtney Dubar, who co-founded Seal Beach-based Affliction in 2005 and remains one of the clothing company’s largest investors.
Dubar, who has family members with ties to Orange County’s punk music scene, became an investor in the Observatory venue in 2011, according to local reports. It holds about 1,000 people and was previously known as the Galaxy Theater.
OC Constellation took out a $5 million loan from the U.S. Bank National Association to finance the purchase, according to property records.
The buildings share a parking lot, and due to the parking needs of the Observatory, the buyers thought it made sense to buy the 3501 S. Harbor office along with the concert venue, according to Karen Munroe, a vice president with the local office of Lincoln Property Co.
Dallas-based Lincoln Property had been acting as the asset manager of the buildings and helped sell them, and the company’s brokers are now working with the new ownership to lease the office building, which is about half-full.
There are no plans for any Affliction operations to move to the Santa Ana office, which is about a mile north of the San Diego (405) Freeway near MacArthur Boulevard.
Affliction moved to OC in 2008 after buying a 54,000-square-foot building at Pacific Gateway Business Center in Seal Beach for a reported $10 million.
Creative Dental
The recently redeveloped Red Hill Avenue building that holds the headquarters of dental-practice manager Pacific Dental Services Inc. in Irvine is up for sale.
The 118,006-square-foot office at 17000 Red Hill Ave., one of the largest creative-office buildings near John Wayne Airport, was recently listed for sale by Newmark Grubb Knight Frank’s Michael Kane and Scott Read.
A sale price for the building, which was transformed in 2012 and 2013 from a 40-year-old industrial property previously used by defense and aerospace manufacturer Rockwell Collins Inc. into an eye-catching office for Pacific Dental, wasn’t disclosed.
A price of more than $30 million appears possible based on prices paid for other creative-office buildings in the area.
An LLC with ties to Pacific Dental, Orange County’s 25th largest private company by revenue, paid a reported $13.6 million for the building in 2012 and spent nearly another $11 million to renovate it, adding a variety of creative-office features, including a covered atrium with meeting space and an employee break area.
Pacific Dental occupies 85% of the property, which is fully leased. The company builds and manages offices for dentists, offering services that take care of just about everything except the actual dentistry.
The building is near the intersection of Red Hill and Alton Parkway, two miles east of John Wayne Airport.
Talega Sale
North Miami Beach, Fla.-based Equity One Inc. has taken over full ownership of Talega Village Center in San Clemente.
The investor said it paid $6.2 million to acquire the equity interests of its joint venture partners in the 103,000-square-foot shopping center, which opened in 2007 and is anchored by a Ralphs Fresh Fare supermarket.
Phoenix-based Vestar Development Co. and Rockwood Capital LLC in San Francisco sold their 52% stake in the property to Equity One, which now places a $23 million value on the shopping center.
Irvine-based Hopkins Real Estate Group built the center, which serves residents near the Talega community, and Rockwood Capital was an initial investor.
Vestar, owner of the District at Tustin Legacy shopping center and a recent investor in other area retail properties, partnered with Equity One to buy an interest in Talega Village about three years ago.
The property is 88% leased and “offers opportunities to increase value through lease-up and re-tenanting,” Equity One said.
It had about $11.4 million in debt tied to it at the end of 2013, according to the buyer’s financial statements.
