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| The Promenade at Howard Hughes Center, West Los Angeles, CA |
LOS ANGELES,
CA, June 22, 2015 – Holliday Fenoglio Fowler, L.P. (HFF) announced today that
it has closed the sale of and secured preferred equity for The Promenade at Howard Hughes Center, a 248,841-square-foot retail
center in West Los Angeles recently repositioned by Passco Companies LLC into
an entertainment-focused destination center.
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| Bryan Ley |
HFF marketed
the property on behalf of the seller, Passco Companies LLC. Laurus Corporation purchased the property and
received senior financing through a major money center bank. Torchlight Investors, LLC provided preferred
equity for the project.
The
Promenade at Howard Hughes Center is a high-profile, two-story outdoor retail
and entertainment center completed in 2001.
Ninety-one percent leased at the time of
closing, the center is home to national tenants that include Cinemark Theatres,
Dave & Busters, Buffalo Wild Wings, Souplantation, Johnny Rockets,
Starbucks and Kabuki Japanese Restaurant.
Situated at
the confluence of Sepulveda and the 405 Freeway, the property has outstanding
visibility with 1,200 feet of freeway frontage and a traffic count of more than
600,000 vehicles per day.
The asset is
located within the Howard Hughes Center mixed-use development that consists of
approximately 1.8 million square feet of commercial space and over 900
apartment units under construction.
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| John Crump |
The Promenade at Howard Hughes Center provides
the only retail amenities in the development and is situated to serve the
surrounding residential and creative office communities of Westchester, Playa
Vista and Culver City.
The project is at
the gateway to the Westside’s Silicon Beach, one of the largest tech hubs in
the world with offices for Google, Hulu, Snapchat, Facebook and more.
The HFF
investment sales team representing the seller was led by managing director Bryan Ley and director John Crump.
HFF’s equity
placement team was led by senior managing director Paul Brindley, associate director Jeff Sause and real estate analyst Ryan Ash.
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| Jeff Sause |
“During our
10-year investment period on the property, we were able to reposition and
transform Promenade at Howard Hughes into the Westside’s premier
entertainment-focused destination center, capitalizing on the desires of
today’s large demographic of millennial consumers,” said Todd Siegel, Passco Companies’ vice president of retail.
“With the repositioning and leasing strategy
we executed, Passco was able to maintain the asset value throughout one of the
worst recessions in retail history.”
Solidifying
Promenade at Howard Hughes’ positioning in the market as an entertainment
center, Passco secured two large entertainment-focused tenants, including the
first Los Angeles location of Dave & Busters, as well as Buffalo Wild
Wings.
According to
Siegel, the new owners of the asset now have the opportunity to take advantage
of the rapidly increasing population of affluent workers and residents located
nearby, as well as tourists travelling to and from LAX.
“The sale of
Promenade at Howard Hughes Center represents one of the largest retail trades
so far in 2015 in West Los Angeles,” Ley said.
“The property is an iconic asset in West Los
Angeles that most residents have visited or passed by while driving on the 405
Freeway.
"More recently, the asset has
seen a tremendous amount of momentum with the expansion of the area, and this
speaks volumes to the further development of the asset with the new owners.
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| Todd Siegel |
“With all
the explosive growth of the Playa Vista/Westchester area and Silicon Beach,
retailers and capital will continue to pour into this area to follow tech
giants such as Google, Yahoo, Facebook and many more, as they call this area
home for their new Southern California offices.”
“Laurus
Corporation plans on implementing a significant renovation plan to enhance the
center’s atmosphere and circulation,” Brindley added.
“With the planned improvements, the property
will provide tenants and patrons with one of the most engaging and accessible
entertainment venues in Los Angeles.”
In addition
to the recent Promenade at Howard Hughes Center transaction, HFF’s Ley and
Crump also recently completed the sale of Lakewood Galleria in Lakewood,
California, and Puente Hills Mall, a 1.1 million-square-foot regional mall in
the City of Industry, California, for their client, a publicly traded
REIT.
In February,
HFF also announced that it had secured joint venture equity for The Village at
Howard Hughes, which is one of the new multi-housing development sites adjacent
to the Promenade at Howard Hughes Center and speaks to the residential growth
in the surrounding area.
For a complete copy of the company’s
news release, please contact:
Kristen M.
Murphy
Associate
Director
HFF | One
Post Office Square, Suite 3500 | Boston, MA 02109
Main:
617-338-0990 | Direct: 617-848-1572 | Cell: 617-543-4873 | www.hfflp.com
