Montecito Property Co. is set to begin selling condominiums at three former Orange County apartment complexes the company bought.
The Jacksonville, Fla.-based investor and developer, founded a year ago, is converting some 900 apartments in Laguna Niguel, Foothill Ranch and Yorba Linda, according to Montecito.
Condo conversions have grown in popularity amid the hot housing market. Montecito bought the apartments from a company controlled by apartment and homebuilding mogul William Lyon.
The complexes were built in the late 1980s and early 1990s to be condos, according to Christopher Lombardo, regional sales manager with Montecito Key Realty, an affiliate of Montecito Property.
When the housing market retreated in the early 1990s, the projects became apartments, Lombardo said. That made the recent switch back to condos easy, he said.
Sources said the 280-unit Laguna Niguel project, now dubbed Lavista, sold for about $85.8 million, or $306,000 per apartment.
The 340-unit complex in Foothill Ranch and the 296-unit project in Yorba Linda likely sold for less because of their locations, sources said.
Montecito teamed with Merrill Lynch Capital, a unit of New York’s Merrill Lynch & Co., on the acquisition.
For more on this story, see the Sept. 19 edition of the Business Journal.
