The Irvine office of real estate developer and investor Hines Interests LP has bought an office building that previously served as headquarters of Westcliff Medical Laboratories Inc.
Houston-based Hines partnered with Los Angeles private equity firm Oaktree Capital Management LP to buy Irvine Corporate Center, a 126,633-square-foot office located at 1821 E. Dyer Road.
The two-story building, located about a block from the Costa Mesa (55) Freeway, has a Santa Ana address but is considered to be part of the Irvine Business Complex, the largely commercial area surrounding John Wayne Airport.
Terms of the sale weren’t disclosed; the building was put up for sale earlier this year with an asking price of about $11 million, or about $87 a square foot.
The seller was SunAmerica Life Insurance Co., of Los Angeles.
Jeff Cole and Ed Hernandez, brokers with the Irvine office of Cushman & Wakefield Inc., represented the seller in the transaction.
It’s the latest office purchase in the IBC for Hines, which has partnered with Oaktree to buy more than 450,000 square feet of low-rise office buildings in the area over the past 18 months. Prior deals, both in Irvine, included Bay Technology Center and Alton Corporate Plaza. Those two deals, and the purchase of Irvine Corporate Center, are believed to have sold for more than $50 million, on a combined basis.
“We remain focused on growing our Orange County portfolio,” said Hines managing director Ray Lawler, who leads the firm’s local development and investment office.
“With our upgrade plans for the property and the area’s overall improving market fundamentals, we expect Irvine Corporate Center to continue to be a desirable place for business,” Lawler said.
Upgrades planned for the Irvine Corporate Center include renovations to the building’s facade, lobby and restrooms, as well as improvements to the property’s landscaping and parking lot.
The property counts its share of empty space. It’s about 25% full, following the departure of Westcliff Medical, a unit of Burlington, N.C.-based Laboratory Corporation of America Holdings, earlier this year.
Westcliff vacated about 66,000 square feet of space in the building in May. The company, which said in 2011 it planned to move or cut more than 300 jobs in Santa Ana, is believed to have moved much of its local operations to San Diego, where LabCorp has other operations.
LabCorp—which has annual revenue of $5.5 billion and a recent market value of $8.3 billion—administers medical tests and processes samples. It bought Westcliff in 2010 for $57.5 million after the latter filed for bankruptcy protection.
Irvine Corporate Center can accommodate office, laboratory and manufacturing tenants ranging from 15,000 to 126,000 square feet, according to Hines.
Joe Bevan and Wade Clark, brokers with the Irvine office of Jones Lang LaSalle, will be handling leasing for Hines at the just-acquired building.
Westcliff’s former space is said to have a large amount of refrigeration units, testing labs that have equipment and over-standard HVAC equipment.
Several medical device companies have operations in the area, including heart valve maker Edwards Lifesciences Corp., Abbott Laboratories, Baxter International Inc. and Medtronic Inc.
The property has changed hands a few times in recent years. SunAmerica took over the property after its former owner gave the building back in 2010, amid falling vacancy rates.
Irvine Corporate Center was constructed in 1976 and renovated 10 years later. The two-story building had an assessed value of almost $19 million a few years ago.
Tenants still at the building are said to include nonprofit, at-risk youth services agency Community Services Programs, which has 15,885 square feet, and financial advisory firm Xroads Solutions Group LLC, which occupies 14,372 square feet.
