Apartment Development Sells for $12.4 Million

ORANGE COUNTY, CA-In the latest sign of the county’s hot investment market for multifamily projects, a group of private investors has paid $12.4 million for the 160-unit Arbors apartment development in the working-class community of Santa Ana.

The seller is CT Realty Corp., a Newport Beach-based investment and development firm. The project stands at 1100 E. Fairhaven, on a six-acre parcel near the Orange (22) Freeway. The buyer is a Newport Beach-based partnership known as Garden Grove Property Associates LLC.

CT Realty, which specializes in purchasing and then improving value-added properties, acquired the complex in March 1998. It immediately launched a $1.1-million rehab that included a complete upgrade of each unit’s interior space and the addition of several common-area amenities.

The development is now 98% leased, in-line with the countywide apartment occupancy factor. Vacancies across Orange County and many other parts of the Southland have steadily dropped and sale prices have surged, thanks to the region’s booming economy, strong job growth and dearth of new multifamily construction.The Newport Beach office of CB Richard Ellis represented CT Realty in the transaction. Garden Grove Property Associates represented itself.