Adaptive Reuse Project Opens in SoCal

Marina del Rey, Calif.–Latitude 33, formerly an underperforming, institutional-looking office building, has been transformed into a modern luxury beach community. The community offers three living options (townhomes, condos and penthouses with floor-to-ceiling panoramic views of the Pacific Ocean) and the property was designed to both complement and draw from the surrounding region, an artistic hotbed where Venice Beach and Marina del Rey intersect.

SunBrook Partners purchased the building when it went into bankruptcy. This was the only office building in Marina del Rey, an area surrounded by residential buildings. Amber Turner, director of sales and marketing at SunBrook Partners, tells MHN, “We have three different products. One is the sky collection, a nine-story tower, which was previously an office building. Then next door is the boardwalk collection, a four-story building that sits on a garage. It was built from the ground up. Third is the beach collection, on which we will start construction in October. It comprises mainly of townhomes with private entries.”

For the office building, the previous owners had ripped the building apart and built an additional skeleton to bring it up to today’s codes. SunBrook purchased building a year and half ago and worked with design group KAA to do further modifications, landscaping and some architectural changes in common areas. “We ripped out the lobby and doubled its size,” says Turner.

The 45-unit building opened in the middle of July and closings will start in October. The building is only a few sales short of completing the Fannie Mae pre-sale requirement. The units range in sizes from 1,274 to 3,140 sq ft. and prices start in the high 500s to low one millions. The penthouses will be released next year.

“We broke the project down into phases so that we can control the number of units on the market at a time and also number of people moving in at a time,” says Turner.

The Boardwalk collection features 27 units ranging in size from 1,680 to just under 2,000 sq ft. The Beach collection will feature townhomes of about 1,800 sq ft. All three products are located over a couple of acres of land. Turner says the company anticipates the project to be completely sold out by 2011.

“It is located in an area where the newly constructed communities that are the main competition have all been sold out and their products. They are further inland than ours, and so we are seeing more of a momentum because our location is superior. There is also a limited selection of re-sale homes because it’s not a large submarket for people who want to live close to the beach,” says Turner.