[IMGCAP(2)]In Santa Monica, NMS Properties has started construction of Quonset Court in Downtown Santa Monica at 829  Broadway on the landmark site of a historic 1946 Quonset Hut. NMS says that the $12 million project will feature 350-square-foot single-story studio apartments designed to capitalize on the success of the developer's mini-loft concept at the 165-unit Olympic Studios, also in Santa Monica. Neil Shekhter, CEO of NMS, notes that Quonset Court is a mixed-use affordable housing and retail project, with 7,000 square feet of retail space and a courtyard over three levels of subterranean parking. The designer for the complex is Killefer Flammang Architects, which also designed Olympic Studios.

The Lincoln Heights for-sale project is called Alta Lofts and is an adaptive reuse of the W.P. Fuller Building, a 131,000-square-foot former warehouse of the Fuller Paint Co. at 200 N. San Fernando Rd. The newly opened loft complex, developed by L.A.-based Lee Homes, features units ranging from 657 square feet to 1,719 square feet in a mixture of flats and two-story lofts with one to two bedrooms. Grand opening pricing ranges from the $200,000s to the $500,000s, paired with an anticipated 3.5% FHA down payment assistance program.

The urban infill project added two floors to the existing four-story warehouse, which was constructed in 1925. The four historic floors contain "hard lofts" featuring original floor-to-ceiling industrial windows―retrofitted with dual panes for noise reduction and energy efficiency―as well as exposed ducts and columns, and no drywall.

Alta Lofts' open-air community spaces include a first-floor courtyard, created when the middle of the building was blown out. Secured parking for residents and guests as well as ground-floor commercial space round out the building.

The $42 million North Hollywood project is called the Senior Artists Colony Project and is slated to be built in the NoHo Arts District with help from the Community Redevelopment Agency of the City of Los Angeles (CRA/LA). The project will incorporate a 76-seat performance theater and a resident production company, plus 15,000 square feet of studio, gallery and classroom space for seniors.

The project will include 27 units of housing for low-income seniors, provide a home for the Road Theatre Co. and provide residents with arts instruction and activities, including involvement in theater productions. Plans and financing for the innovative complex were approved this month by the CRA/LA Board of Commissioners. If also approved by the City Council, CRA/LA will help jump-start the project by purchasing the property at 10747 W. Magnolia Blvd. from the developer for $5.8 million, provide an $800,000 pre-development loan and lease back the property for 57 years.

Meta Housing Corp., an affordable housing developer specializing in senior apartment communities, formed a limited liability company, NoHo Senior Artists Colony LLC, to build the project. It will consist of 92 one-bedroom, one-bathroom units, eight two-bedroom, one-bathroom units and 26 two-bedroom, two-bathroom units.

In addition to CRA/LA funding, the project financing includes $25.2 million in tax-exempt bonds from the California Statewide Communities Development Authority, $2 million in tax credits, $3.4 million in developer equity and deferred fees and $500,000 in anticipated grants. The NoHo project is one of a number of multifamily developments in which the CRA/LA is involved, including the $80 million MacArthur Park Apartments, at 7th and Alvarado streets.

The two Oxnard projects are developments of the Daly Group and Aldersgate Investments, which recently awarded contracts to Westlake Village-based Huitt-Zollars for engineering and survey mapping services for the projects. The Daly Group development is Oxnard Village, a privately funded transit oriented mixed use redevelopment project at the intersection of US 101 and Highway 1. The affordable housing component will be located on three acres within the 64-acre site, which at build-out will feature 1,500 residential units including affordable housing, market rate row-housing, live-work and twin 25-story luxury high-rise condominium towers.

The Aldersgate Investments development is an affordable housing development within the 700-acre RiverPark master planned community in Oxnard, now under construction. The project will feature approximately 156 units as well as a half-acre public park on a 6.5-acre site located along RiverPark Boulevard and American River Court.