COMMERCIAL
The tough economy’s been a drag on most office landlords of late.
But one office building in Orange County has seen an uptick in business recently.
Aliso Viejo-based TechSpace Inc., an office campus operator that offers flexible lease terms and ready-to-use technology for smaller businesses, is in the process of adding a few tenants, according to Vic Memenas, the company’s chief operating officer.
TechSpace’s building, in Aliso Viejo’s Summit Office Campus, was about 92% full as of mid-March. A few more deals should push that level closer to 95% by month’s end, Memenas said.
That’s better than local averages. The county’s office market counts a vacancy rate of about 16%. In Aliso Viejo the vacancy rate is closer to 12%.
“We knew we would do well in a rising market, and we always suspected that the opposite (was true),” said James “Watty” Watson, TechSpace’s chief executive.
In markets like today’s, smaller companies “really don’t want to sign long leases,” or invest in heavy amounts of overhead to get an office going, Watson said.
The latest tenants include a new batch of entrepreneurs,as many who have been let go from other companies look to create their own ventures,as well as more established small businesses that aren’t sure how much staffing they’ll need later this year, according to Memenas.
Typical TechSpace tenants employ 10 to 20 people and many have lease terms that run as short as six months.
The way that space in the building is configured, a new tenant signing a lease today can move into the building almost instantly, Watson said.
The Aliso Viejo office contains about 86,000 square feet of office space. The building’s been getting a makeover, after it signed a $25 million lease last summer to stay at its current location through 2017.
TechSpace opted to relocate some amenities at the building, primarily a gym and restaurant on the ground floor of its 65 Enterprise building, in order to fit more office space there.
Trigild Lands Account
San Diego-based Trigild Inc., a distressed receivership, property and loan recovery company, said it was appointed receiver for 12 apartment complexes in Arizona, California, Colorado and Florida previously run by Bethany Group LLC.
Irvine-based Bethany Group saw a large portion of its national portfolio file for bankruptcy earlier this month. Those properties, in Texas and Maryland, are expected to be managed by Robert Mosier, of Costa Mesa-based turnaround management company Mosier & Co.
Trigild is taking over properties that have not gone bankrupt. They include a portfolio of seven complexes in the Phoenix area and one property in San Diego County, the 114-unit Sunset Village Apartments in Oceanside.
RESIDENTIAL
Irvine-based Real Estate Disposition Corp. got the kind of good press few businesses do these days: a photo of its thriving home auction operations on the cover of the Wall Street Journal this month.
The Journal reported on a March 8 auction of some 350 homes and condominiums in the New York area, which took place in one of the city’s convention centers.
It was the second New York sale run by REDC, the country’s largest auctioneer of foreclosed homes. It brought in about a thousand potential bidders, according to the paper.
REDC claims to have sold more than $3 billion of real estate, the majority of it in the past year. Its next OC-area auction is slated for April 5 in Anaheim. Some 360 homes are listed for auction at the event, although fewer than 50 of the homes are located in the county.
Not every aspect of the New York auction garnered positive press. The Journal report noted that outside the auction, protesters picketed the event, chanting “Evictions are a crime! It could be your house next!”
Higher-End Auction
John McMonigle, a well-known broker of high-end OC homes, has his own auction program that is ramping up.
His Newport Beach-based brokerage, the McMonigle Group, recently launched what it’s calling the “90 day certain sale program.” It aims to use an online auction process and other methods to get sales completed using what it describes as “an aggressive pricing and promotional strategy.”
Among other features of the auction, a property’s price is reduced by a set percentage each week for every week it remains unsold, for up to eight weeks, the brokerage said.
Right now there are about 20 owners who are using the program, with listings ranging from a 5-bedroom, $8 million Newport Coast property to an unfinished lot in Ladera Ranch with a $400,000 price tag.
