St. Clair Readies Inland Empire Lot Sale; OC Homebuilding Permits Down
COMMERCIAL
Phoenix-based Summit Builders has joined the growing list of major construction firms setting up shop in Orange County.
Summit Builders, ranked No. 314 on the Engineering News-Record’s list of largest contractors in the nation, opened an office at the corner of Von Karman Avenue and Birch Street in Newport Beach.
“The new location will increase the level of service our California-based clients receive,” said Jeffrey C. Stone, president and CEO of Summit Builders. “It will also provide our pre-construction and construction department a home base for Summit’s projects up and down the California coast.”
The company has been active in OC. Summit Builders recently completed a Hilton Garden Inn Hotel and a Hampton Inn and Suites in Garden Grove. The company is working on a 384-room Crowne Plaza Hotel and a Homewood Suites in Garden Grove. The company has ongoing projects in Santa Ana and Aliso Viejo, as well.
RESIDENTIAL
Newport Beach-based The St. Clair Co., an opportunistic company that aggressively built up its landholdings in the early stages of the current economic recovery, is about to turn one of those acquisitions into a revenue generator.
The land development company is close to finalizing deals to sell 358 lots to five homebuilders in its 533-acre Oak Valley Greens masterplanned community in Beaumont in the Inland Empire. In fact, interest from builders has been so strong that the company is moving to add an additional 200 lots to its Phase One sales program, said Steve St. Clair. Lots are expected to fetch $50,000 to $70,000.
“We’re pleasantly surprised with how well it’s going out there,” St. Clair said.
Grading of Phase One is under way and is expected to be completed by October. The first phase includes a 12-acre community park with picnic, basketball and tot-lot facilities. Additionally, the community will have jogging/walking trails.
The community, which is next to the 18-hole, par-72 Oak Valley Championship Golf Course, is scheduled to begin its sales program to the general public in the spring. When completed, Oak Valley Greens will include 1,629 homes for active adults and 908 single-family residences. Home sites will range from 5,000 square feet to one acre.
The community is being marketed to homebuilders by O’Donnell/Atkins Co. of Costa Mesa.
Separately, the St. Clair Co. is about to open escrow for the sale of 114 lots in Chino Hills to an unnamed buyer. The property overlooks the Western Hills Golf Course in Carbon Canyon Road.
Fewer Homebuilding Permits Pulled
Higher home prices are taking their toll on the residential real estate market. While permits for single-family detached homes were down across the state and most of the West, Orange County is taking the brunt of it. The number of permits pulled for single-family homes in Orange County is down 17% year-to-date, according to U.S. Housing Markets, a publication of local research and consulting firm The Meyers Group.
The West overall is down 1%, with local markets such as Riverside-San Bernardino and San Diego off 2% and 11%, respectively.
The Orange County figure was attributed to the lack of ready-to-build land. The past few years’ active market has reduced whatever inventory existed in the aftermath of the recession, and while new masterplanned communities such as Ladera Ranch have launched sales, it is not enough to feed the hungry appetite of OC homebuyers.
The situation is not expected to change for the better any time soon. Most observers don’t see a large influx of finished lots, meaning inventory will continue to be tight.
Separately, in the resale market anecdotal evidence suggests sellers have begun adjusting their expectations of how much they will be able to get for their homes. The average Orange County homeowner using the Internet to sell his or her property in July expected to fetch $295,000, the second-highest figure in the country but a 5% decline from the June figure, according to HomeGain’s Online Home Seller Index, which tracks such activity. (San Diego topped the list with homeowners in that county expecting to fetch an average of $308,000 for their properties, up 11% from the June figure.)
Orange County also ranked high in a list of areas with the priciest real estate by the square foot, coming in third with an average of $172 per square foot. Only San Francisco ($219) and San Diego ($176) ranked higher. Los Angeles came in fifth at $157 per square foot.
On the other end of the scale, the Inland Empire is the only Southern California area that was ranked among the areas yielding the lowest price per square foot. The Riverside/San Bernardino area was ranked fifth at $85 per square foot. The place where you get the most bang for the buck? Dallas, at $77 per square foot.
