Clarion Sells Playa Vista Office To Barings For $151M
Barings has closed on the $150.7M purchase of a roughly 307K SF, two-building office campus in Playa Vista.
The property has attracted 78K SF of new leasing over the past 24 months, according to Newmark.
Newmark co-Head of U.S. Capital Markets Kevin Shannon, Vice Chairmen Ken White, Rob Hannan, Laura Stumm and Michael Moll represented the seller, Clarion Partners. Clarion bought the property in 2014 for about $133M.
Though the property has maintained 90% average occupancy level since 2016, it's now facing “significant near-term expirations,” according to the release. Those eminent lease expirations did not deter potential buyers, according to Newmark.
“The willingness of institutional investors to take on leasing uncertainty is a clear vote of confidence in both the Playa Vista submarket and the broader office recovery,” Stumm said.
“The market continues to reward high-quality assets, and this sale reinforces that trend,” she added.
The transaction was the highest sale price in Los Angeles this year to date, according to Newmark research. There have been a handful of high-profile sales, such as Kingsbarn Realty Capital buying the Hollywood offices of shapewear company Skims Body Inc.
But a Q1 Avison Young report found that sales of office properties were down 58% YOY in terms of number of transactions, with just 27 transactions in the first quarter.
In October, Clarion sold a Santa Monica office building fully leased to Universal Music Group for $185M.
