COMMERCIAL
One of the three Irvine condominium towers built by Phoenix-based Opus West Corp. has been put up for sale,along with a majority of the commercial properties owned by the troubled developer.
As expected, Opus West filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy earlier this month, listing close to $1.5 billion in liabilities.
To rid itself of much of that debt, the company immediately placed up for sale about 50 commercial properties and land holdings, which it owns directly or through special purpose entities.
An auction reportedly is slated for Aug. 26 in Dallas, where the properties,in California, Texas and Arizona,are to be sold. Those properties have about $970 million in debt tied to them, and the debt is held by nearly 20 different lenders.
Last week another property was added to the auction block: 3000 the Plaza. That’s the last of the three condo towers that Opus West built in a partnership with Scottsdale-based Geoffrey H. Edmunds & Associates Inc.
The tower, which has 105 condos, still has 55 units for sale, according to the company’s marketing materials. The property, which has a rooftop pool, has $37.4 million in debt tied to it. Opus has an 85% stake in the project, according to the company.
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Opus Center Irvine III tower: up for sale |
Initially, only one Opus building in OC had been listed to be auctioned: the high-rise office building it built near John Wayne Airport in 2007. The Opus Center Irvine III tower, which is a third full, currently has about $81 million of debt tied to it, according to the developer’s data.
There’s no minimum bid tied to the 314,000-square-foot office building, which Opus has a 65% stake in, according to the company’s marketing materials.
That office tower appears to have the most debt tied to it of any asset on Opus West’s books, other than a retail center in Chino Hills that has $105 million in debt.
Storage Start
A company that provides financing and investment advice to the self storage industry has kicked off business in Newport Beach.
Davies Ingersoll Capital Partners, which began operations this month, plans to provide debt, equity and debt purchase financing, in addition to arranging equity and structured financing, for clients.
The company’s founders include Chief Executive Peter Ingersoll and President Jim Davies.
Davies previously served as senior vice president for Buchanan Street Partners, a Newport Beach unit of Los Angeles-based TCW Group Inc. He was a cofounder of Buchanan’s storage capital division.
Ingersoll is a longtime self storage investment broker who also serves as managing director of a Sperry Van Ness franchise.
RESIDENTIAL
One of the Business Journal’s neighbors at our new Irvine Towers office building has been acquired.
The origination and servicing assets of Irvine-based Sierra Capital Partners, which provides loans to apartment owners and developers on the West Coast, was bought by Boston-based CWCapital, a lender to owners of apartments and healthcare real estate.
CWCapital made the deal to expand on the West Coast, the company said.
Sierra Capital Partners was founded in 2003 and counts about a dozen employees. The company’s founders, Trent Brooks and Bryan Frazier, have been directly involved in providing more than $12 billion in apartment financing during the past 15 years.
