Costa Mesa mortgage lender American Home Loans has inked a deal for a new Irvine headquarters that’s more than double its current base.
The retail lender will be subleasing a 39,060-square-foot office at 15360 Barranca Parkway, part of Irvine Co.’s Lakeview Business Center, a collection of nearly 20 midsize buildings in the Spectrum area of the city.
The building has been used by several notable local real estate companies. It was long the headquarters for Standard Pacific Homes, and it later served as the Western U.S. base for CalAtlantic Homes following Standard Pacific’s merger with Ryland Homes in 2015.
American Home Loans is subleasing the space from Lennar Corp., which bought CalAtlantic in 2018 and now has its local operations about a mile away in the city.
American Home Loans previously occupied about 12,000 square feet in Costa Mesa. The expansion was prompted by internal growth and a looming hiring push, according to Barry Gail of Orion Property Partners, who represented AHL in the deal.
Lennar (NYSE: LEN) was represented by Bruce Schuman and Stephen Pisarik of the Newport Beach Savills Inc. office.
Opportunistic Deals
Miami-based Lennar, which acquired CalAtlantic in a stock and cash deal valued at about $9.3 billion including debt, previously had area operations in Aliso Viejo; it has since established a West Coast operations office at the Five Point Gateway in Irvine, where it leases nearly 130,000 square feet. That office complex is run by another firm with ties to Lennar, developer FivePoint Holdings LLC (NYSE: FPH).
The deal with CalAtlantic made Lennar the county’s largest homebuilder.
American Home Loans’ sublease for the Spectrum location ends August 2022. The space was on the market for about two years, according to CoStar Group data.
Negotiations for the deal wrapped prior to recent market uncertainties caused by COVID-19.
Still, there is room in the market for future opportunistic leases, Gail notes.
“Despite the challenging current circumstances, the recent lull may allow companies to make beneficial deals on their own terms,” Gail said.
