Jade Enterprises Picks Up Major Office Portfolio

LOS ANGELES—Jade Enterprises has purchased a five-property office portfolio in West Los Angeles. The name of the seller and the purchase price were not disclosed, however, sources unrelated to the deal have told GlobeSt.com that Blackstone sold the property to Jade Enterprises for $158.8 million. The office properties in the portfolio are traditional office properties, which are expected to see phenomenal rent growth because of the lack of traditional office supply in this market.

"We had a lot of interest from both institutional and private investors," Ryan Gallagher, senior managing director at HFF, tells GlobeSt.com. "There are a lot of wealthy families in L.A. that still like the hard asset play, and that coupled with some of the strong locations in the portfolio made it really attractive, especially in a continuing market recovery. We still think that this market has a fair amount of legs, given the fact that there is no new construction and overall as an economy, California is extremely diverse. There is no one sector that we are extremely worried about at this point. This is still a really good time to buy." Gallagher represented the seller in the transaction, along with HFF senior managing director Todd Tydlaska and director Andrew Harper.

The economic growth was initially isolated to specific Westside markets, but now, the growth has become more widespread, but the only new office supply coming on the market is targeted to creative office users. "As we have seen the hot pockets fill in and there is no vacancy, the traditional office tenant doesn't really have any choices and those choices are starting to get more and more limited," says Gallagher. "We are starting to see really big jumps in rent growth, and given the lack of new supply, we don't see that changing any time soon."

The five properties in the portfolio total 350,000 square feet and are located at 350 South Beverly Drive in Beverly Hills; 2730 Wilshire Boulevard in Santa Monica; 1950 Sawtelle Boulevard and 11075 Santa Monica Boulevard in Los Angeles; and 6167 Bristol Parkway in Culver City. The properties are 91% leased, and have an average lease term of four years, which will easily allow the new ownership to push rents.