RESIDENTIAL
Standard Pacific Corp.’s growth plans are getting even bigger.
Earlier this month, I wrote a story detailing the quick pace of land deals being struck by Irvine-based Standard Pacific.
The company, the largest homebuilder based in Orange County, approved more than $300 million worth of land deals nationwide so far this year, with a bulk of those deals in California.
Since that story, details of what appears to be Standard’s largest land deal so far this year have come out—a San Diego County buy that could cost close to $150 million when all is said and done.
The company said this month it had bought the options to acquire Harmony Grove Village, a 470-acre project in north San Diego. The semirural, equestrian-themed development has entitlements for nearly 750 homes and likely will take about two years of site work before Standard officially takes over the land.
Homes at the development, which is near Escondido, will be priced from about $350,000 to about $1 million, according to reports.
Santa Monica-based developer New Urban West Inc., which has spent the past seven years getting the project moving forward, is selling the land. Its principals are retaining an ownership stake in parts of the venture, according to reports.
New Urban West initially planned to start construction in 2008. But plans were put on hold as the housing market turned.
Among local projects, New Urban West also has been working with AMB Property Corp. to get entitlement work done on a 17-acre site in Anaheim’s Platinum Triangle, where 1,200 homes, offices and shops have been proposed.
COMMERCIAL
Two former executives of a shuttered San Clemente-based real estate investor are part of a newly formed, Newport Beach-based real estate client services and asset management firm.
Axxcess Capital LLC recently kicked off operations. The Newport Coast-based company’s website bills the firm as an alternative investment provider that focuses on various group investments, as well as commercial real estate client services and asset management.
The company has four principals, including Chairman Dick Gee and President Timothy Snodgrass. Both were executives at San Clemente’s Argus Realty Investors LP, which during the peak of the market was OC’s second-largest tenant-in-common investor.
After the market turned, management of Argus’ portfolio was turned over to Irvine’s Thompson National Properties LLC, with Snodgrass and Gee joining that company in late 2008. They left about a year ago.
Other executives at Axxcess include Chief Executive Eli Spiro, who previously was a managing director at New York- based private investment firm Greystone & Co.
The company’s fourth principal and chief operating officer is Craig Morris, who previously was president of Irvine-based brokerage Orion Property Partners Inc.
CT Realty Buys
Aliso Viejo’s CT Realty Investors has teamed up with three other companies to buy an empty, 1.4 million-square-foot industrial site in San Bernardino.
The four investors partnered to buy the El Cajon Distribution Center, which is made up of two vacant buildings at 7010 and 7140 N. Cajon Blvd. The property, on a 63-acre site, was built in 2008.
Others in on the deal include San Diego-based real estate investor Westcore Properties, New York-based private equity firm PCCP LLC and Addison, Texas-based real estate investor Behringer Harvard.
Terms of the transaction and the name of the seller weren’t disclosed. According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, a fund managed by Behringer Harvard paid $4.2 million for a 16% stake in the project.
That would appear to put the project’s total sales price at about $26.3 million, not including debt that the buyers took on in the deal.
The buy is representative of CT Realty’s “aggressive acquisition strategy,” according to Chief Executive James “Watty” Watson.
“This project offers tremendous ‘value-add’ potential,” Watson said.
Storage Fundraising
Ladera Ranch’s Strategic Storage Trust Inc., which invests in self-storage sites across the country, is gearing up for another round of fundraising.
The company this month filed preliminary plans with the Securities and Exchange Commission to raise up to $1.1 billion. Proceeds from the offering, which likely would kick off next year, will be used to buy self-storage facilities and related self-storage real estate investments.
Strategic Storage owns 34 properties in 14 states, including one facility in California. Those properties total 23,485 self-storage units in about 2.9 million square feet of space.
The company’s raised about $170.3 million to date from an initial offering, which launched in 2008. That ongoing stock offering is designed to run through early 2011 at the latest, at which point the new fund would kick in.
