Irvine-based California Coastal Communities Inc., a developer that’s seeking to build on Huntington Beach’s problematic Bolsa Chica wetlands, reported higher fourth-quarter profits and sales, despite selling fewer homes.
The company on Wednesday said it earned $3 million in profit for the quarter, up 30% from a year earlier. Sales were 17% to $39 million.
California Coastal said it sold 62 homes in the fourth quarter, down from 88 a year earlier.
The company’s sales and profits gains appear to have come from higher prices for its homes: The average price of a California Coastal home sold jumped 66% to $626,000 in the fourth quarter from a year ago.
The company sold homes in Chino and Riverside during the quarter.
Newport Beach-based William Lyon Homes Inc. on Tuesday also reported a rise in profits and revenues in the fourth quarter, despite a drop in the number of homes sold.
William Lyon said sales from homebuilding could drop 10% to 15% this year as a result of delays due to wet weather and a decline in orders for new homes.
Homebuilders saw sales cool in the second half of last year in Orange County. Prices have remained at record levels here.
California Coastal also said in January it filed an application with the state’s Coastal Commission to develop 347 homes on 68 acres near the Bolsa Chica wetlands. The total of 208 acres it owns overlooking the wetlands account for 62% of its assets, the company said.
“This new application reflects elimination of development in environmentally sensitive habitat areas and increased buffers between the habitat areas and the proposed development,” the company said in a statement.
California Coastal said it reduced its proposal by 32 homes and nine acres after getting feedback during an October hearing before the Coastal Commission.
The commission should hold another hearing in April, the company said.
Previous legal wrangling with environmental groups over the wetlands drove the company into bankruptcy, from which it emerged in 1997.
