SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO, CA—Westcore Properties was able to increase the occupancy of its Westcore Executive Center here by more than 50% before selling it for $23.8 million. The firm's approach to opportunistic investing worked for the disposition of this asset.

Jeff Chiate, Jeff Cole, Ed Hernandez and John Gallivan of Cushman & Wakefield represented Westcore in the transaction. GlobeSt.com's has learned that the buyer is San Juan Owners LLC.

The two-building, 115,517-square-foot office property, located at the I-5 freeway and Highway 73 at 29122 and 29122 Rancho Viejo Rd., was purchased off-market by Westcore out of foreclosure in 2010 when occupancy rates were in the low-30% range. Today, the two-story property, which was constructed in 2007, is 85% leased and includes tenants Cosco Fire Protection and Global Financial Data, among several others. It features a tropical outdoor central courtyard with a nearly 30-foot-tall steel woolly mammoth sculpture created by Southern California artist Danny Salzhandler.

According to Marc Brutten, founder and chairman of Westcore, “We identified this high-visibility project as one that had strong future viability, yet needed a restructured capital stack with strong sponsorship, so we seized the opportunity before the project came to the market.”

Don Ankeny, president and CEO of Westcore, adds, “We successfully stabilized this property within four years and felt now was a good time to sell. We will continue our strategy of being responsive to new opportunities to deploy our capital in high-quality industrial and office buildings throughout western US markets.”

Westcore recently disposed of another Southern California property. As GlobeSt.com reported in July, the firm reached an agreement to sell its 128,300-square-foot Southrail Business Park industrial complex in Chula Vista, CA, for $11.2 million to Focus Real Estate LP.