Fitness Firm Inks B-T-S Deal

LOS ANGELES-A new 24 Hour Fitness Magic Johnson Sports Club will take shape at Crown Realty & Development s Wateridge office campus under terms of a 15-year lease the fitness firm has signed for a 37,000-sf build-to-suit at the office campus.

The new facility will front on Slauson Avenue at the entrance to the office campus and is slated to open in the summer of 2004. Terms of the lease were not disclosed, but industry sources indicate the value of the deal at approximately $13 million.

The fitness chain was represented in the transaction by Steve Solomon of CB Richard Ellis, along with Bill Bauman and Bryan Norcott of Colliers Seeley International. Crown was represented by Wateridge’s listing agents: Jeff Pion, Deron White and Lynn McCarthy, all of CB Richard Ellis.

The build-to-suit will be the second new development at the campus for Crown, which acquired the Wateridge office campus in 2000. In June of 2002, the firm completed a 200,000-sf class A office building at Wateridge Two, the second phase of office development at the site. That building is now anchored by BAE Systems, a local aerospace design and engineering company. Wateridge is a four-building, 550,000-sf campus on Slauson Boulevard just east of the 90 (Marina) Freeways ending.Crown, based in Beverly Hills and Irvine, is a real estate investment, development and management firm that focuses on the acquisition, repositioning and renovation of retail, office and other commercial property types. Among its projects are the renovation of Media City Center, the 1.2 million-sf super regional mall in downtown Burbank that it acquired earlier this year; and the construction of a 34,000-sf build-to-suit Circuit City location in Hawthorne. Those two developments are part of a portfolio of properties owned by Crown and its affiliates that exceeds $450 million in value.

The 24 Hour Fitness chain is headquartered in San Ramon and counts more than 2.7 million members in more than 300 clubs across 16 states.