LOS ANGELES-A joint venture of Kearny Real Estate Co. and Morgan Stanley has sold six buildings at the venture's Kearny South Bay Business Park, a 42-acre office and industrial development that formerly served as the Nissan North America headquarters, according to Kearny partner Tony Nobuyuki. The complex, which Kearny and Morgan Stanley developed after the auto maker moved its North American headquarters to Tennessee in 2006, comprises 13 office and light industrial buildings ranging in size from 14,000 sf to 183,000 sf.

The centerpiece of Kearny South Bay Business Park is a nine-story office tower, built in 1971, that was acquired by Tireco Inc., a major US distributor of tires and wheels for the automotive and trucking industries. The company will relocate its headquarters to the building by the second quarter of 2008.

In a $16.4 million transaction, apparel company Fang Fashions has acquired a two-story, 124,000-sf light industrial building at 18455 S. Figueroa St. According to James Min of Colliers International Korea Group, the acquisition enabled Fang Fashions to consolidate its operations, which were previously housed in numerous facilities, into a single building in a key strategic location for both distribution and business operations.

Min and David A. Drummond, SVP in the South Bay office of Colliers International, represented Fang Fashions in the transaction. The glass and concrete structure that Fang acquired includes 74,000 sf of office and 50,000 sf of industrial space.

The company will move its corporate headquarters, which it has outgrown, from its original location in Gardena, where it has been since its founding in 1996. The new headquarters provides 74,417 sf designated as office space and 49,611 sf for industrial space. According to Min, the transaction occurred following more than two years of research aimed at acquiring a high-quality facility in a key strategic location for the clothing company.

In the other transactions, men's fashion designer Hause of Howe bought a 14,009-sf creative office and studio building at 18505 Broadway; Pacific Transportation Federal Credit Union bought a 21,080-sf building at 501 W. 190th St. to serve as the company's new corporate headquarters; IT services firm En Pointe Technologies acquired a 29,032-sf office building at 18701 S. Figueroa St. in a relocation from El Segundo, and electronics manufacturing firm Qual-Pro Corp. bought a 54,758-sf concrete tilt-up industrial building at 18510 S. Figueroa. Kearny Real Estate Co. was represented in all the transactions by the leasing team of John Ayoob and John Schumacher of CB Richard Ellis.

Nobuyuki says that Kearny expects the businesses occupying its South Bay Business Park to eventually employ more workers than the 2,000-plus that Nissan employed when it occupied the property. Thanks to the demand at the business park, Kearny has already added more than 250 parking spaces to the existing buildings, Nobuyuki notes.

After acquiring the complex from Nissan in October 2006, the Kearny-led partnership made significant capital improvements and upgrades to the individual buildings before returning them to market for sale earlier this year. Nobuyuki says that Los Angeles-based Kearny plans to move forward with a five-building, 43,000-sf industrial development and add a small restaurant and retail center designed to serve both the business park and the local community.

"We saw the potential to market the individual buildings for sale to growing, small and mid-size businesses when we purchased the campus," Nobuyuki explains. "Small businesses are thriving, especially in the South Bay where these entrepreneurial companies are continuing to outgrow existing facilities and the interest rate environment still lends itself to buying instead of leasing." In addition to the six recent sales, Kearny has two more buildings under contract that are expected to close by the first quarter of next year.