LOS ANGELES-USC has renewed for 160,000 square feet at Marina Towers in Marina del Rey, and law firm BuckleySandler has expanded to 11,967 square feet at 100 Wilshire in Santa Monica in two recently signed Westside L.A. office leases. The USC deal is the largest office lease in West Los Angeles this year, according to Brookfield Properties, owner of the Marina Towers.

Marina Towers is composed of two 12 story buildings, one called Marina Towers North at 4640 Admiralty Way and one called Marina Towers South at 4676 Admiralty Way that were built in 1972 and 1970, respectively. The two towers total 380,000 square feet and are owned by a joint venture between affiliates of Brookfield Properties and Goldrich & Kest.

The USC space houses the university's Information Sciences Institute, a research and development center for information processing, computer and communications technologies. The institute is a unit of USC’s Viterbi School of Engineering, one of the nation’s largest university-affiliated computer research institutes.

USC was represented by Howard Feuerstein of Travers Realty and Steve Walbridge and Eric Duncanson of Cushman & Wakefield. John Barganski and Chris Dillavou of Brookfield Properties represented Marina Towers. Terms of the lease were not disclosed.

In the BuckleySandler lease, the law firm is now leasing a full floor at the 100 Wilshire building. The new lease increases its space from 2,293 square feet to 11,967 square feet. CBRE's Matt Perlmutter and Ben Gary of the Beverly Hills office represented the tenant in the transaction, which is valued at almost $7 million. The landlord, Douglas Emmett, was represented by Eric Olofson and Scott Menkus of Cushman and Wakefield.

BuckleySandler has rapidly added to its team of financial services regulatory, transactional, litigation, and enforcement attorneys since its formation in March 2009 with the merger of Buckley Kolar LLP and a group of 15 lawyers led by Andrew Sandler, a former partner at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, and co-chair of BuckleySandler.

Clinton Rockwell, BuckleySandler's Los Angeles managing partner, comments that the firm is "taking advantage of an opportune time in the Los Angeles real estate market to lock in our space needs for at least the next 10 years." The building BuckleySandler will occupy was commanding the highest rents in Los Angeles just a couple of years ago. "As vacancy on the Westside has increased and lease rates have dropped, BuckleySandler was able to lock in a beneficial long-term rate, and in doing so, position themselves for continuing growth," said Perlmutter.