Two local investors have teamed up to buy a second office campus in the San Gabriel Valley.
Irvine-based Stillwater Investment Group and Greenlaw Partners recently entered into a venture with CrossHarbor Capital Partners in Boston to buy The Lakes at West Covina, a 176,843-square-foot, two-building office campus.
The partnership acquired the asset from an undisclosed seller for just under $34.9 million. The buyers said the purchase price is about 40% less than what the sellers paid for the office in 2007.
The property is next to the West Covina mall just off the San Bernardino Freeway and sits on 6.2 acres. The buildings are about 74% leased; large tenants include Wells Fargo Bank, Balfour Beatty, the State of California, and the U.S. Government Services Administration.
It’s the first acquisition for the partnership, which may make other value-add office acquisitions in Southern California, said officials representing it.
Stillwater and Greenlaw have worked together before to buy offices in the San Gabriel Valley.
In March they partnered with Chicago-based Walton Street Capital LLC to acquire a two-building, 176,000-square-foot office complex in San Dimas previously home to the headquarters of WesCorp Credit Union. The deal was valued at about $18 million.
John Drachman founded Stillwater last year. He previously worked for Greenlaw Partners, one of the most active buyers of value-add properties in Orange County in recent years.
CrossHarbor Capital Partners is based in Boston and has a second office in Newport Beach.
Covina Complex
A new investment fund headed by Irvine-based Sares-Regis Group has picked up a soon-to-be-improved apartment complex about five miles from The Lakes at West Covina office complex.
The multifamily investment arm of Sares-Regis recently closed on Vista Pointe, a 216-unit rental complex about a mile south of the Foothill (210) Freeway in Covina.
TIAA-CREF sold the 1400 Grand Ave. property on undisclosed terms.
Sares-Regis bought the complex using its Value-Add Multifamily Fund II. It’s the company’s first purchase under the fund. Its prior fund raised more than $100 million and has bought nearly 1,400 apartments in California, Washington, Oregon and Colorado since 2013.
The real estate investor and developer said it plans major improvements and upgrades to the 11-acre Covina property, which is about 12 miles east of downtown Los Angeles.
On the development front Sares-Regis’ multifamily group is working to get approvals for a new 136-unit condo development that would be built in the area between downtown Long Beach and that city’s East Village Arts District. It also has a project under way in the Park Place mixed-use campus in Irvine.
Fullerton Record
A small retail property in downtown Fullerton has traded hands at what brokers involved in the deal are calling a record price in the city.
A Newport Beach-based investor operating under the 101 Harbor Properties LLC name recently completed the purchase of 101 N. Harbor Blvd., a 12,765-square-foot property on the northwest corner of North Harbor Boulevard and Commonwealth Avenue.
The building traded hands for just under $11 million, or about $858 per square foot. That’s a record per-square-foot for a multitenant retail property in Fullerton, according to the Newport Beach office of Marcus & Millichap, whose Paul Bitonti represented the seller, a local developer that operates under the VMA Commonwealth LLC name.
The retail building opened in 1956 and underwent a major renovation five years ago. Tenants include Bolü Bakery & Café, Salon Technique and Fuoco Pizzeria Napoletana.
The site is within walking distance of Fullerton College and Western State College of Law at Argosy University.
More than 60,000 cars pass by it each day, which combined with tenants’ absolute net leases, justified the sale price, Bitonti said.
