COMMERCIAL
Newport Beach-based KBS Realty Advisors, one of the country’s most active buyers of non-distressed real estate in the past few years, has another real estate investment trust in the works.
The company, which has raised more than $2 billion for two active non-traded trusts and last year began plans to launch two additional funds, this month filed a registrations statement for a fifth potential offering: KBS Real Estate Investment Trust III Inc.
The latest offering could ultimately raise up to $2.8 billion to buy commercial buildings, loans tied to properties and similar investments, according to the company’s registration statement.
The trust will be led by KBS Realty’s executives, which include Chief Executive Charles Schreiber and President Peter Bren, brother of Irvine Company’s Donald Bren.
The company’s two other active non-traded funds have bought about $3.6 billion of real estate and related investments since late
Deals completed in the past month include the $74 million acquisition of a nearly 580,000-square-foot office complex in Clayton, Mo., and the $57 million purchase
of a 315,000-square-foot office in Portland, Ore.
KBS’ trusts also recently originated $80 million of loans that allowed borrowers to fund the purchase of a 221-room Fisherman’s Wharf hotel in San Francisco and a 22-story tower in Austin, Texas.
Calsonic Sale
An Irvine building that previously held the local operations of auto parts maker Calsonic North America Inc. has traded hands in one of the larger industrial sales seen in South County of late.
Costa Mesa-based Brookhollow Industrial Properties LLC just bought a 185,020-square-foot industrial build-ing at 9 Holland St. The building’s off Bake Parkway, near the former El Toro Marine base.
The empty warehouse traded hands for about $9 million, or roughly $49 per square foot. Due to the tough loan market, it was an all-cash deal, according to brokers at the Newport Beach office of CB Richard Ellis Group Inc. who worked on the deal.
Japan-based Calsonic Kansei Corp., which counts its U.S. headquarters in Tennessee, sold the building. In 2008, CalsonicKansei North America Inc. said it would be shutting down its local plant, after more than four decades of manufacturing in the county.
The maker of tubes and hoses for auto air conditioners had employed about 250 workers locally.
The buyer is a venture of Costa Mesa-
based real estate investor Brookhollow Group and Penwood Investment Management, a Hartford, Conn.-based pension fund adviser.
The buyers plan to spend more than $1 million renovating the building, which has been vacant since early 2009, and market it for lease.
CB Richard Ellis Group Inc.’s Gregg Haly, Jeff Carr and Dave Desper represented the buyer and seller in the deal.
Accretive Gains
Irvine-based Accretive Laguna Partners LLC has sold a small portion of its Providence Center development in Fullerton at a not-so-small price.
The developer, which has been building a combination of medical offices and restaurants near St. Jude Medical Center, recently sold an 8,047-square-foot retail center for nearly $5 million, or about $619 per square foot.
The property, at 1981 Sunnycrest Drive, holds three tenants and was finished last year. The sale is believed to be the highest price per square foot paid for a multitenant retail center in Orange County in the past 15 months, according to brokers with Irvine-based Faris Lee Investments.
Shaun Riley, director of advisory services for Faris Lee, represented Accretive Laguna in the deal. Edward Kim of Los Angeles-based Realtyland represented Seyoung LLC, the La Habra-based investor that bought the center. According to Riley, the buyer paid cash and the sale closed at a 6.7% capitalization rate.
The retail center includes Panera Bread, ZPizza and Phans 55, all of which recently signed 10-year, triple net leases.
Accretive Laguna had intended to sell off the retail portion of its Providence Center development while holding on to the office portion of the project, said John Wadsworth, vice president for the Irvine office Colliers International, which is handling leasing and office sales at the project.
Providence One, an 86,000-square-foot medical office building on the campus, is about 80% full, while Providence Two, a 24,000-square-foot, for-sale medical office condominium project, is about 25% sold, according to Wadsworth.
