It’s no high-rise, but The Irvine Company is readying to start an office building near its headquarters in Newport Center.
The county’s dominant office landlord plans to break ground on a 40,000-square-foot building on Newport Center Drive at Pacific Coast Highway.
Construction on the two-story project, known as Corporate Plaza West, could start within the next month or so, company officials said. It should take about a year to complete.
McLarand Vasquez Emsiek & Partners Inc. of Irvine is heading up the project’s design.
The project is the first for the Irvine Co. in Newport Center in about three years.
Another low-rise building,a three-story, 55,000-square-foot building at 680 Newport Center Drive,was the last office addition to the buildings and shops that surround Fashion Island. That building is fully leased.
Demand for office space is behind the latest project, according to Irvine Co. officials.
“This is a small building, and demand is always incredibly strong in Newport Center,” spokesman Bill Rams said. “We believe it will lease up quickly.”
The offices around Fashion Island are about 96% full, making it tough for businesses in the area to find space, according to Randall Parker, managing director for the Newport Beach office of tenant brokerage firm Travers Realty Corp.
“If you’re looking for 10,000 square feet of space or more in the (Newport Center) high-rises, you have zero opportunities right now,” he said. “And there are only one or two opportunities in the low-rises.”
The new building could draw wealth management or other financial tenants, he said. The project’s location along Pacific Coast Highway should be a selling point, according to Parker.
Rents won’t come cheap. Newport Center commands just about the priciest rates for office space in the county.
Other similar Irvine Co. low-rise offices in Newport Center have monthly asking rents of $3.90 per square foot to $4.20 per square foot.
Brokers expect rents for the new building to be in the $4.20 to $4.50 per square foot range.
High-rise offices at Newport Center have asking rents as high as $5.50 per square foot, according to the Irvine Co.’s Web site.
The average asking rent in the county for the best office space now stands at about $3 per square foot.
Few developers have moved on large office projects,or just about any development, for that matter,in Newport Beach since voters there passed 2000’s Greenlight, a slow-growth measure that puts sizable projects to a vote.
The Irvine Co. building won’t trigger a vote because the project’s size falls under Greenlight’s threshold. Nor does it require a change in zoning, another vote trigger.
Greenlight II, a harsher slow-growth law opposed by real estate and other businesses, was rejected by voters in November.
