[citywatch]

Conversely with those cities they didn't neglect their middle/working class neighborhoods from the start. When you starve those areas it will lead to the decline that we all desperately don't want. If those services are distributed equitably and not a lot here to their campaign contributors and the hell with everyone else. Then things like projects like improving the Central Core won't come with such resentment.
Cities like NYC, Chicago or SF actually have long been known as places for mainly the rich & the poor, where the middle class has been shrinking for yrs & yrs. But it's the cities that end up with primarily the poor that end up with the worst reputation & that eventually get ignored out of existence.

BTW, to anyone who thinks this is getting OT from the subj of a new office bldg in DTLA, the reason it's been tough for ppl like Robert Maguire to construct highrises for businesses is because many companies & the ppl that occupy them have been fleeing from LA for a looong time. IOW, when a city doesn't attract or hang onto businesses, there won't be much need for new office space.

So while you worry about things like the lower income folk on Broadway & in other parts of the city, I'll worry about things like those ppl who can have a positive impact on a city continuing to wanna live & work anywhere but in a hood like DTLA (http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showpost.php?p=2417066&postcount=144).

[LA21st]

^ What really burns me is when some of those ppl are the very ones who eventually decide to pick up & move to the burbs or some other city, never to be seen or heard from again.

When it comes to their idealism, talk is cheap. And so when the kids need a decent school, when the fear of crime becomes too tiring, when the supply of good jobs isn't plentiful enough, when the grit, grime & homeless problem finally starts to become too depressing even for the cool urban hipster----when cities like NYC or Seattle (or Chicago or SF---see below) start to look too interesting & shiny as alternate places to call home-----where will the ppl who claim to love LA's lowlife grit & loser funkiness be then?

I guess I'm really pissed off right now because I was talking to a friend earlier tonight, back from a trip visiting an old high school chum in Chicago. My friend is a native of LA & in all the yrs I've known her here she's never----never!----tinkled all over her hometown the way she tinkled all over Chicago. She said she "looooooved" Chicago & would "looooove" to live there.

Dealing with her & that ridiculous woman from India several days ago (the one who looooved SF but wasn't so thrilled with LA) is really starting to take a toll on me :cool:

Its only a matter of time before Chicago strips itself competely of its outdated image of blue collar and Al Capone etc. It blew me away in 2002, and I didnt even prefer older cities at the time. I loved LA and Cali (still do) but Chicago...I was just in awe. Michigan Ave was packed with people on this cold, snowy day in March ON A WEEKEND! I liked it so much, I ended up moving from DC 3 years ago. Now I live 1 block from Michigan Ave, and its just a neighborhood to me. :)

[Wright Concept]

[/b]
Cities like NYC, Chicago or SF actually have long been known as places for mainly the rich & the poor, where the middle class has been shrinking for yrs & yrs. But it's the cities that end up with primarily the poor that end up with the worst reputation & that eventually get ignored out of existence.

BTW, to anyone who thinks this is getting OT from the subj of a new office bldg in DTLA, the reason it's been tough for ppl like Robert Maguire to construct highrises for businesses is because many companies & the ppl that occupy them have been fleeing from LA for a looong time. IOW, when a city doesn't attract or hang onto businesses, there won't be much need for new office space.

So while you worry about things like the lower income folk on Broadway & in other parts of the city, I'll worry about things like those ppl who can have a positive impact on a city continuing to wanna live & work anywhere but in a hood like DTLA (http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showpost.php?p=2417066&postcount=144).


Reading is Fundamental. Citywatch, you use more spin than the Fox News Channel.

"Conversely with those cities they didn't neglect their middle/working class neighborhoods from the start. When you starve those areas it will lead to the decline that we all desperately don't want. If those services are distributed equitably and not a lot here to their campaign contributors and the hell with everyone else. Then projects like improving the Central Core won't come with such resentment.

Chicago for example had went through a rut in the Seventies and Eighties, right when Richard M Daley, became mayor, he followed his dad's- Longtime Mayor Richard J Daley- advice which was "Take care of the taxpayers, and take care of them well. Because when they see things like garbage collected frequently, Streets landscaped and cleaned, Police on the beat on the street. They'll feel comfortable paying their business or property taxes even when you have to increase that tax."

The very first plans Daley worked on was street and park maintenance and beautification. It wasn't sexy like a new subway line or new high rises everywhere but it was practical and can be done within an election cycle and the residents can see the improvements and it is what will lead to those other items like more mass transit infrastructure and high rises.

The irony here is the run around the bureaucrats give to the working/middle class when it comes to things like street beautificationon City owned property BTW. If they were to do something on it that actually helps the City will do everything in their power to stop it or block it. But when the residents ask the city to do it, the city pats them on the head and say ok and does nothing."


Protecting that sought after middle class as well as bring up that small percentage of the Working Class that are so close to reaching middle class status is important to keep the cities and their cores running. By cities improving those services as the last poster mentioned in Chicago that created a cycle of improvements that benefit the city.

Start with the basics and then built up. Don't neglect the areas so they won't come back to neglect you when it's needed most.

[pip]

^ What really burns me is when some of those ppl are the very ones who eventually decide to pick up & move to the burbs or some other city, never to be seen or heard from again.

When it comes to their idealism, talk is cheap. And so when the kids need a decent school, when the fear of crime becomes too tiring, when the supply of good jobs isn't plentiful enough, when the grit, grime & homeless problem finally starts to become too depressing even for the cool urban hipster----when cities like NYC or Seattle (or Chicago or SF---see below) start to look too interesting & shiny as alternate places to call home-----where will the ppl who claim to love LA's lowlife grit & loser funkiness be then?

I guess I'm really pissed off right now because I was talking to a friend earlier tonight, back from a trip visiting an old high school chum in Chicago. My friend is a native of LA & in all the yrs I've known her here she's never----never!----tinkled all over her hometown the way she tinkled all over Chicago. She said she "looooooved" Chicago & would "looooove" to live there.

Dealing with her & that ridiculous woman from India several days ago (the one who looooved SF but wasn't so thrilled with LA) is really starting to take a toll on me :cool:

I'm in a sour mood about my city, Chicago, today so I will have a go at this.

Your friend that visited Chicago probably has a case of 'the grass is greener on the side.'

Another poster mentioned Chicago retaining its middle class. It doesn't and hasn't for about 50 years.

The very first plans Daley worked on was street and park maintenance and beautification. It wasn't sexy like a new subway line or new high rises everywhere but it was practical and can be done within an election cycle and the residents can see the improvements and it is what will lead to those other items like more mass transit infrastructure and high rises.
If you saw what Chicago looked like in the 80's it needed work. Yes Daley landscaped the shit out of a lot of it but all he did was bring it up to not look like a war had occured aside from a few lakefront yuppie neighborhoods that have their own organizations, like the North Halsted Merchants Association, to take care of the stuff.

We deal with constant impending doomsday CTA - public transit, scenerios unless the cash strapped State of Illinois comes up with more money. Haha, like that is going to happen. Unbfortunetly these doomsday scenerios seem to be coming of fruition. We deal with some crazy ass crimes that make me seriously wonder about humanity. The Chicago Public Schools is another disaster. I have read many times on SSP about unequel funding of schools, urban vs. suburban. But the fact remains that the City of Chicago spends more per student than all but a few of the wealthiest suburbs. Check out the results of the Chicago Public Schools. Pretty poor.

The City of Chicago is sitting on a financial crisis in the economic backwaters of the post industrial rust belt area of the nation. Like they are going to be able to fund more public transit improvments or fix this or that.

As Chicago's role as an International leader has dissappeared and its role as a national leader dissappearing; it is just barely holding on because its legacy was so great I wonder what does the future hold? Not much if you ask me. When people jump with excitment of population losses not being as bad as thought or the constant reminder of the 90's of the census disaster of poor estimates and with the 10 year count showing a small gain after decades of losses, that shows you the hard times fallen upon this city. Especially when you consider immigrants skip the city all together now and go directly to the suburbs unlike the 90's. Rack up the losses again Chicago!

So yeah, It sucks. Picking up the newspaper and reading about this person was stabbed and this person was shot or this is underfunded or this is falling apart or anything or just the general chaos of a rust belt city with its crazy out of control citizens. And you wonder why people leave. It is all pretty obvious why they do. Our cities are basket cases and it is depressing to think Chicago will not have a major revival that brings up the whole city in my life time aside from a few neighborhoods here and there.

Well I'm about to go out and have a beer shortly. Gee, should I check to see were the local muggings in my neighborhood took place this weekend before I leave my apartment. It is too bad much of Chicago is too dangerous for me to enter let alone go and have a beer at a local tavern. You should tell your friend that visited to move to Chicago for a while for a wakeup call.

I wonder people who are impressed with Chicago had such low expectations to begin with that they are surprised to see that it does not resemble Gary Indiana thus thinking 'this place is nice.'

If Chicago really is one of the top tier cities in the country all that does is reaffirm my conclusion that American cities suck.




I was not mocking or making fun of your friend citywatch. I', just generally pissed off with Chicago lately

[citywatch]

Citywatch, you use more spin than the Fox News Channel. About what? I merely stated that cities like NYC, Chicago & SF have been losing their middle class ppl for yrs & yrs. You don't think that's true?

I also don't know of any policy followed by those cities that expressly attempts to hang onto such middle class ppl. So while the DTs or centers of those cities remain somewhat strong or very strong (ex: Manhattan), they really haven't done much more than LA has done to retain middle class residents.

However, I will agree with you that while a pol like Chicago's mayor has been focusing on the specifics of making his town look better, most of the pols & others here in LA have been similar to a person going to a big job interview dressed like a bag lady who hasn't bathed in 2 yrs.

And the reason I can't spend too much time worrying about the poor folk on Broadway, McArthur Pk or elsewhere, is because (1) they'll always be a major part of a city like LA----IOW, they aren't going nowhere, because too much of LA still is seen by many ppl, esp from the burbs or the supposedly "beautiful" cities, as a sty that only the desperate or renegade can deal with----while (2) the problems described in these 2 stories indicate that if there's any group the city should be worried about----because a lot of them may very well lose patience & say "see ya, wouldn't wanna be ya" to LA in the future----it's the ppl & businesses who rent space in office bldgs.



Real Estate
Daniel Miller

Questions Raised About Feasibility of Maguire High Rise

WHEN developer Robert Maguire announced plans for a 50-story office building in downtown Los Angeles, civic leaders and the real estate industry lauded the plan for the first new skyscraper in the area in over 14 years. But some in the industry are questioning whether the $300 million building will ever be built, suggesting Maguire may have announced plans for the building at Figueroa and Seventh streets as a way to beef up the value of his Maguire Properties Inc. real estate industry trust.

The REIT is on the market, with bids reportedly due by early November from private equity firms. Michael Knott, an analyst covering the office property sector for Green Street Advisors Inc., a Newport Beach boutique research firm, doesn't go so far as to say Maguire has no intention of building the tower---he just doubts it will happen.

The downtown office market has a vacancy rate of 14.3 percent and monthly Class A asking rents of $2.82 per square foot in the third quarter, according to Grubb & Ellis Co.

"There is a little bit of glossing up the for-sale package. Rob Maguire is trying to demonstrate the health and vitality of the downtown L.A. office market," said Knott. "The current rents don't seem to justify new construction. It doesn't make sense."

However, other observers go so far as to say that they believe Maguire really does have little intent to go forward. (Maguire Properties did not return repeated calls seeking comment.) REIT Zone---a widely read REIT industry publication---reported on Oct. 19 that Maguire's building announcement was simply a "head fake," and that the company "continues to press ahead with its privatization plan."

REIT Zone's Editor Barry Vinocur said Maguire may be trying to divert attention from this week's initial public offering by REIT Douglas Emmett Inc., a Los Angeles office owner. "I'm sure on some level he's looking at getting attention focused off of Douglas Emmett," Vinocur said. "I'm sure he wants to clarify issues related to the possible sale of the company."

Closer to home, Zaya Younan, chief executive of Younan Properties Inc., a national office properties investment group based in Woodland Hills, said REITs have been known to "pump up" their portfolios in advance of sales. "He (Maguire) is not valued very well (by Wall Street)," said Younan, who also believes that current downtown rents and vacancy rates make the proposed skyscraper, called 7+Fig, impossible to justify. "The best way to get higher valuation for himself and his investors is to dress up his portfolio so he could be a target for takeover."

The building site for the nearly one million-square-foot building is a vacant lot owned by Maguire. The building needs city approval if plans are to move forward. If the skyscraper were not built, it would be a blow to downtown boosters who looked to Maguire's Oct. 16 announcement as a milestone in downtown's emergence.

Carol Schatz, president of the Central City Association, said the building " means downtown is back completely." However, if 7+Fig isn't built, Schatz says she hopes another developer would move forward with a similar project. "We hope that the economics which would have ostensibly caused the announcement would still prove true for some other office developer," she said.


Comment
Charles Crumpley

Are Things Looking Up?

ROBERT Maguire's announcement last week that he plans to build an office skyscraper downtown is not just significant, it's an inspiring vote for downtown. Let's just hope it gets built.

Skyscrapers, such as the 50-story tower he envisions, have an outsized effect on morale. Call it a psychological effect, if you will, but when people drive into town and see a big building going up, one that transforms their skyline, they have tangible evidence in their windshield each day that smart money is making an important bet on the future of their city.

I've long been convinced that a conspicuously tall building boosts its neighborhood more than any other single development, event or enterprise zone. True, L.A.'s downtown area has enjoyed real progress in recent years. There's been a significant amount of condo conversions and rehabbing of old buildings. And the $2.5 billion L.A. Live complex is obviously a huge deal. Still, the fate of the downtown boom seems fragile. At least one developer has pulled out. The homeless have spread out, thanks to an appeals court decision, creating more challenges for downtown residents and businesses.

That's why a conspicuous tower going up in the heart of the city would be visible reassurance, a statement that this is a city worth a $300 million investment. But if Maguire's building doesn't go up for whatever reason---and there are skeptics in the real estate community---it would have the opposite effect. It would be an outsized disappointment to a downtown that doesn't need disappointments.

[LA21st]

I'm in a sour mood about my city, Chicago, today so I will have a go at this.

Your friend that visited Chicago probably has a case of 'the grass is greener on the side.'

Another poster mentioned Chicago retaining its middle class. It doesn't and hasn't for about 50 years.


If you saw what Chicago looked like in the 80's it needed work. Yes Daley landscaped the shit out of a lot of it but all he did was bring it up to not look like a war had occured aside from a few lakefront yuppie neighborhoods that have their own organizations, like the North Halsted Merchants Association, to take care of the stuff.

We deal with constant impending doomsday CTA - public transit, scenerios unless the cash strapped State of Illinois comes up with more money. Haha, like that is going to happen. Unbfortunetly these doomsday scenerios seem to be coming of fruition. We deal with some crazy ass crimes that make me seriously wonder about humanity. The Chicago Public Schools is another disaster. I have read many times on SSP about unequel funding of schools, urban vs. suburban. But the fact remains that the City of Chicago spends more per student than all but a few of the wealthiest suburbs. Check out the results of the Chicago Public Schools. Pretty poor.

The City of Chicago is sitting on a financial crisis in the economic backwaters of the post industrial rust belt area of the nation. Like they are going to be able to fund more public transit improvments or fix this or that.

As Chicago's role as an International leader has dissappeared and its role as a national leader dissappearing; it is just barely holding on because its legacy was so great I wonder what does the future hold? Not much if you ask me. When people jump with excitment of population losses not being as bad as thought or the constant reminder of the 90's of the census disaster of poor estimates and with the 10 year count showing a small gain after decades of losses, that shows you the hard times fallen upon this city. Especially when you consider immigrants skip the city all together now and go directly to the suburbs unlike the 90's. Rack up the losses again Chicago!

So yeah, It sucks. Picking up the newspaper and reading about this person was stabbed and this person was shot or this is underfunded or this is falling apart or anything or just the general chaos of a rust belt city with its crazy out of control citizens. And you wonder why people leave. It is all pretty obvious why they do. Our cities are basket cases and it is depressing to think Chicago will not have a major revival that brings up the whole city in my life time aside from a few neighborhoods here and there.

Well I'm about to go out and have a beer shortly. Gee, should I check to see were the local muggings in my neighborhood took place this weekend before I leave my apartment. It is too bad much of Chicago is too dangerous for me to enter let alone go and have a beer at a local tavern. You should tell your friend that visited to move to Chicago for a while for a wakeup call.

I wonder people who are impressed with Chicago had such low expectations to begin with that they are surprised to see that it does not resemble Gary Indiana thus thinking 'this place is nice.'

If Chicago really is one of the top tier cities in the country all that does is reaffirm my conclusion that American cities suck.




I was not mocking or making fun of your friend citywatch. I', just generally pissed off with Chicago lately

Much of Chicago is much too dangerous to go to a bar? Where? Christ, the northside of about a million is safer than Manhattan. If much of Chicago is dangerous, what is safe? I have no idea what you are talking about. I never feel threatened, have yet to see a crime here.

Every newspaper has crimes reported. Yea it sucks that there is so much crime in this country, but every city has this. NYC, DC, Baltimore etc. Chicago probably wont bring "the whole city up" in our lifetimes. No American city will. It sucks, but their will always be crime, poverty, shitty schools etc.
The middle class is shrinking everywhere, even in the burbs.

Basically, all cities have the same problems, some worse than others. Chicago is certainly doing alot better than most.

[colemonkee]

Not the best news for this tower. I'm no expert on construction financing, but I would guess that they would be under intense scrutiny trying to take on a large debt while losing $10 million every quarter.


Maguire Sees Profit Fall Further
Los Angeles Business Journal
10/31/2006

Maguire Properties Inc. reported a third quarter loss of $10.2 million (22 cents per share), an improvement from a $16.1 million loss (37 cents) from the same period a year earlier.

Revenues for the Los Angeles-based real estate company were also down 13 percent to $113.5 million. A conference call will be conducted Wednesday at 10 a.m. to discuss the earrings, the company said.

Maguire shares closed up 24 cents Tuesday to close at $42.76.

[RAlossi]

Speaking of office space, does anyone know what the more prominent office leasing lists are? I'm thinking of eventually opening up a small office in DTLA, but I have no idea where to start looking at office space listings.

[citywatch]

^ All I know is that you'll have an easier time finding space in DT than farther west. That's because I continue to read things like the following. IOW, there still are 30 to 35% vacancies in two A grade, trophy highrises in the hood??! At this late date?!!? WTF?! (One bit of good news is that a restaurant in the 7th&Fig shopping ctr is doing well)

:gaah:


When New York-based Brookfield Properties Corp. chose Los Angeles for its West Coast hub, it did so with a bang. Last month, the firm closed an acquisition of Trizec Properties for $4.8 billion. Brookfield now owns Bank of America Plaza at 333 S. Hope St., the Figueroa at Wilshire property at 601 S. Figueroa St., Ernst & Young Plaza at 725 S. Figueroa St. and its adjacent 7+Fig shopping mall.

Q: What is the occupancy rate in the buildings?

A: Occupancy is very high at Ernst & Young and at the Bank of America building. It is almost 70% leased at 601 Figueroa. When we bought that building, we knew that Sanwa Bank would be moving out, so we have about 300,000 square feet to lease there.

Q: What type of retail are you looking for?

A: We will continue to bring in retail that adds new and different tenant amenities. We are looking at the appropriate kinds of restaurants, more of the fast casual that is becoming very popular right now like Wolfgang Puck Gourmet Express and the Daily Grill, as well as staples like Morton's Steak House. It's interesting that the Morton's at Ernst & Young in October was the number two [seller] in the entire country. That's really saying something about the vibrancy in Downtown.

Q: What does Brookfield think about the new neighbors planned for the area, such as the building announced by Maguire Properties adjacent to 7+Fig?

A: For a new building to start in Downtown, we need to see additional tenant migration from outside the market, which is a positive element, and rental rates that are $4 to $6 higher per square foot per month than they are today to justify new construction. We would be optimistic and supportive of a business environment in Los Angeles that was that healthy.



In 2003, Thomas Properties Group Inc. purchased Arco Plaza for a reported $270 million and vowed to turn the project into prime real estate. Three years and $125 million in renovations later, City National Plaza's 2 million square feet of office space is 65% leased.

"The thing about Downtown is we don't really attract new tenants," said Martinez. "It's more of a musical chairs kind of market and [Thomas Properties is] getting in front of the right tenants and bringing them in. Their approach is to offer a lot of incentives."

Although Arco Plaza was technically 20% leased in 2003, that figure might as well have been zero after Arco Corp. was sold and Bank of America decided to relocate its main branch elsewhere in Downtown, Handleman said (Bank of America Plaza is now at 333 S. Hope St).

With office space now 65% leased, the next challenge awaits on the ground floor. According to Smith, a fine dining restaurant for the Plaza level will be announced in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, negotiations continue below ground where the retail space is only 40% leased.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

the buildings were in need of renovations big time, and when they got them, only a couple of years ago, they started filling up. a jump from 10 percent to 70 percent in only a few short years is something to be proud of and reflects the POSITIVE in the new downtown LA. just beating a dead horse i guess :)

[citywatch]

Here's something else that makes me go :gaah::

"The thing about Downtown is we don't really attract new tenants," said Martinez. "It's more of a musical chairs kind of market and [Thomas Properties is] getting in front of the right tenants and bringing them in. Their approach is to offer a lot of incentives."

[citywatch]

just beating a dead horse i guess :)I've been waiting for yrs & yrs for that horse to finally get up & start galloping. But since it so far just keeps lying there, I have to laugh even louder at those ppl who think the biggest concern for the city is that Broadway or other parts of DT, or McArthur Pk will become too gentrified & scare off low income businesses & shoppers.

[WesTheAngelino]

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-sbmurders6nov06,1,1000463.story?coll=la-headlines-california

San Bernardino's bad luck underlies its crime wave
The city's poverty and gangs are partly inherited from L.A., and it's hard to beef up a police force.
By Maeve Reston and Ashley Powers
Times Staff Writers

November 6, 2006

As daylight faded in San Bernardino, Reggie Brown, 12, traced a familiar path on his red bike: from Home Avenue to the white house on Magnolia Street where his friend Anthony Ramirez, 11, lived before he was shot to death.

One evening in June, nearly a dozen neighborhood kids were choosing teams for a pickup basketball game at nearby Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School when a 15-year-old aspiring gang member fired into the crowd, striking Anthony in the back.

The ballplayers scattered, but Anthony's oldest brother turned back when he heard his name being called out. Help me, Anthony had begged as he lay bleeding on the asphalt. Anthony died with family members at his side.

"When Anthony died, they just didn't come out and play no more," said Reggie, resting on his handlebars near the Ramirez house. "Every time I ride up this street, I'll be like, 'This is Anthony's street.' Every car that drives by, I'll be like scared and wanting to like hide behind a car or something."

Reggie's neighborhood, where families trade gossip over fences, is far from San Bernardino's roughest. But in recent years, there are few havens in the city.

Last year, just three California cities — Compton, Oakland and Richmond — ranked higher in an authoritative research group's study of the nation's most dangerous cities, based on an analysis of FBI crime statistics.

This city of 200,000 recorded 58 homicides in 2005. Nine of the 45 people slain in San Bernardino so far this year — the latest being early Saturday morning at a party — were under 18, sparking both outrage and fear in city neighborhoods.

Although the jump in homicides is less dramatic than during the crack epidemic of the early 1990s, when Money magazine ranked San Bernardino the most dangerous place in the state, the city is again edging toward unwelcome notoriety.



A city left behind

As some San Bernardino County cities have prospered, replacing dirt lots and blighted neighborhoods with coffee shops and even some million-dollar homes, San Bernardino has remained entrenched in poverty. One-third of its residents depend on welfare.

Depressed housing prices have attracted buyers priced out of inner-city neighborhoods in Los Angeles and elsewhere, police and demographers said. And as the newcomers have moved in, officials said, they've brought with them street gangs and increased crime.
"San Bernardino has inherited L.A. County's poor and at-risk families," said economist John Husing. "Is it expected to be the dumping ground for everyone else's poor people?"
The city's meager tax base has left it ill-equipped to handle its problems. The police force, with about 300 officers, is stretched thin. San Bernardino has about 30% fewer officers per capita than Los Angeles, whose force is generally considered understaffed.

"We didn't get into this state overnight," said Police Chief Michael Billdt. "We're not going to get out of this state overnight. It's going to take time — it's going to take years."

City officials are asking voters Tuesday to approve a sales tax hike that would allow them to hire 40 more police officers over three years. But even then, stemming crime — and reassuring residents — are difficult propositions.

Juliana Gonzales grew up on 15th Street, a three-block stroll to King Middle School on Medical Center Drive, where Anthony Ramirez was killed. Since the recent spate of shootings, that seems too foreboding a distance for her 16-year-old son to walk after sunset.

"It's sad that we need to be like that…. You're supposed to feel safe in your neighborhood, but in this time and age, it's impossible."

The night Anthony Ramirez was shot was the first and last time his mother, Michelle, let her two eldest sons play basketball beyond Magnolia and 15th streets. She now refuses to let them walk around the corner to a friend's house — insisting on driving them the short distance.

"It's hard because they're teenagers and they want to be out, but I don't want them out," she said. To protect their other sons, Michelle and her husband have decided to leave the neighborhood.

Far less run-down than other parts of San Bernardino's West Side, the neighborhood's population is a racial mix — about half Latino, a third black and a quarter white — with more homeowners than the city average, according to census figures. Some families have lived in the same stucco homes for three or four decades and are deeply tied to local groups and churches.



The gang gantlet

Several streets, however, are plagued by violence, prostitution, drug sales and multigenerational gang families, police and residents say. Two-thirds of the neighborhood's households make less than $25,000 a year.

King Middle School Principal James Espinoza said 11 gangs surround the campus. He's had students come into the office to report that they "accidentally got shot at on the way to school." After one shooting, Espinoza began giving rides to one student who said he was too afraid to walk home.

"There's almost no kid in the neighborhood who doesn't know somebody who's been shot or killed," Espinoza said. "But there's also a culture of faith and a culture of learning — so you have competing forces, and we just refuse to give up."

San Bernardino has had its share of ups and downs since it was incorporated in 1854. When its Mormon founders were called back to Salt Lake City three years later, they dumped their land for cheap, depressing the town until the railroads stepped in at century's end, said Nick Cataldo, past president of the city's historical society.

During the 1970s, the working-class city gained a reputation as a place that, though lacking in polish, got things done and earned All-America City honors in 1976. That honor became a punch line in the early 1990s as the San Bernardino Police Officers Assn. hawked "Murder City" T-shirts to raise funds for a police memorial and the city took one economic hit after another.

Interstate 15, which connects western San Bernardino County and the Cajon Pass, had cemented Ontario — not San Bernardino — as the region's transportation hub, said Husing, the regional economist.

Over two decades, Kaiser Steel in Fontana, Santa Fe Railroad's West Coast repair yard and Norton Air Force Base — with at least 10,000 jobs at the air base alone — all decamped.

Engineers and plant workers fled to other cities, selling their aging bungalows. Investors snatched up the properties, banking on a real estate boom that paled compared with other Southland cities'. In September, San Bernardino's median home price of $322,250 was about $40,000 lower than the county's, and its average rental prices are among the area's lowest.

Apartment complexes have crumbled into de facto housing projects to create "a neighborhood that no one wants to invest in," said Jim Morris, the mayor's son and top aide. "Nobody really wants to be there."

Still, the city has not given up.



Remedies in action

In the summer, Mayor Patrick J. Morris, a former Superior Court judge, rolled out Operation Phoenix, which targets a 20-block crime-ridden area in the city's center. Code enforcement officials have stepped up complaints against landlords for graffiti, overgrown shrubs and poor lighting. Police have received two teams of additional officers from the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department and the California Highway Patrol to help guard the streets.

Since January, violent crimes including homicide, rape and robbery have dropped 29% in the Operation Phoenix area, police said. Burglaries have declined 71% and thefts 48%, though assaults have risen.

Citywide, violent crime has dipped about 13% while the homicide rate has remained on par with last year's: about one slaying a week.

The mayor said he intended to target slumlords and entice renters to become homeowners with mortgage or down-payment assistance. The city plans to buy apartments blighting residential areas, and a developer wants to raze a dilapidated downtown mall to build town houses and condos.

A few blocks north of the Operation Phoenix area, where street gangs patrol their turf, Tralunia Jones, Reggie's mother, said she had narrowed her son's neighborhood boundaries to a few blocks. Mount Vernon Avenue and Medical Center Drive mark how far east and west Reggie can ride his bike — even though the most desirable city pools and ball fields are far beyond those limits.

"There haven't been problems on this street, but it's all around us," said Jones, who has lived on 15th Street for seven years. "You can't stop it."

Community leaders contend the city has ignored gang intervention programs, and in June, program directors rallied at City Hall for more funding and jobs for kids from the most crime-ridden blocks. Activists fear that the city's politicians often favor suppression efforts, such as adding officers — an approach that temporarily stems crime and wins votes but doesn't rebuild the community.

"We can't arrest our way out of the problem," said Terrance Stone, who founded the Young Visionaries gang intervention program. "In gang life, it's not a bad thing to go to jail. It's like a normal person going to college."

Though a teenager named James Lamont Bagsby was charged with Anthony Ramirez's murder, officials said the arrest came, in part, because he had escaped from a juvenile group home in the high desert and had few ties to the area.

Police have yet to make an arrest in another high-profile slaying down the street. In May, Jarred Mitchell, 14, was dancing in a friend's yard on Home Avenue when a silver car drove past and a gunman unloaded several rounds. The bullets grazed Reggie's older sister's head and killed Jarred.

"With these young kids, it's kind of hard for them not to be around gang members," said Jarred's grandmother, Meredith Mitchell. "So there's nothing you can do, really. There's not too much you can say."



Missing a friend

On Magnolia Street, Reggie shrugged and stared at the ground when asked what he misses about his friend. The boys met when their kindergarten and first-grade classes mixed at Rio Vista Elementary School. A budding Little League pitcher devoted to the Dodgers and Raiders, Anthony "was just cooler than everyone else," Reggie said.

On that June evening, Anthony and his two older brothers had met their buddies to shoot hoops, promising their mother they would soon return for tacos. Two teenagers, investigators said, sauntered up to the boys and asked if they belonged to the gang called West Side Verdugo — Spanish for "executioner."

They said no. It didn't matter. The shooter pulled a gun from his waistband and ran backward, spraying bullets.

Summer has since cooled to fall. Classes have started again at King Middle School, which Anthony would have attended, just like his older brothers and their friends.

His death still weighs on the boys in the neighborhood.

Sometimes, Reggie said, he starts biking toward the Ramirez home, forgetting Anthony is gone.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

wrong thread?

[WesTheAngelino]

It's relevant to the conversation between citywatch, PV, myself and a few looky lous earlier in the thread, which btw, was originally directed there not by me.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

cool

[citywatch]

If a lot more companies follow Herbalife's lead, then maybe this proj won't be a dream:


Industry Has Faith in Maguire

Despite high vacancy rate in downtown L.A. and high costs, many market watchers think new office development will make it

By KEELEY WEBSTER
CREJ Staff Writer
NOVEMBER 6, 2006

Maguire Properties Inc.'s reported plans for a 50-story office tower in downtown Los Angeles has some real estate watchers scratching their heads, while others wonder what Robert Maguire, the company's chief executive, knows that they don't.

"It must be a dream," said David AuBuchon, an analyst with St. Louis-based A.G. Edwards & Sons Inc. "You can't justify building an office building in the downtown market with the rents where they are and with the space currently available, including what Maguire has vacant."

The vacancy rate in downtown Los Angeles is 11.3 percent with effective annual rents of $22.34 per square foot, according to Marcus & Millichap's "Office Research Quarterly Update for Los Angeles County" published in August.

Maguire didn't return calls seeking comment, however plans for the office tower at 755 Figueroa St. were mentioned in the company's third quarter development pipeline issued Oct. 31.

"The rents in that market are in the high teens or $20 triple net," AuBuchon said. "It's going to cost them north of $400 a square foot to develop that building - to me that doesn't pencil out. A 6.6 percent return is pretty thin these days."

:gaah:

However, Maguire has a reputation for making things work, which might inspire copycat actions.

"Most likely, he just feels there is a major tenant in the marketplace considering the building [so] he wants to place a timeline on the building," said John Guinee III, an analyst with Baltimore-based Stifel, Nicolaus & Co Inc. "Or, he is trying to keep someone else, who owns a competing site, from starting construction."

Guinee doesn't think Maguire's announcement is connected to press reports in early September that Maguire was shopping his portfolio, in which case a new development might make the company more valuable. "I think it is tangential to reports of the company being for sale," Guinee said. "It is more likely that he is trying to lure a major tenant in versus signaling anything that would have to do with a pending sale."

And creating some preconstruction buzz could attract corporate attention downtown.

"He wants to monetize or place a value on the undeveloped property," said Kevin Housman, a senior vice president for Tranwestern Commercial Services. "It announces its potential, gets a stir in the tenant market, and it might help generate preleasing activity."

In early September, reports came out that Maguire had been talking to investment bankers about a possible sale. Guinee speculated at the time that if Maguire made such a move, it would follow the lead of Reckson Associates Realty Corp., which sold off two-thirds of its company and took the remaining one-third private. "I think that [theory] is very much alive," Guinee said. "There is a lot of buzz in the industry. He is trying to get a lot of things going."

The idea that Maguire, who is in his mid-60s, might be contemplating selling his company to cash out and retire is unfathomable to those who know him, however. "I thought five years ago he might start to unwind, but he's been more aggressive. He went public. He's turned up the energy," said Whitley Collins, managing principal in The Staubach Co.'s Los Angeles office, who said he has known Maguire for 20 years.

Collins can't imagine a "deal junkie" like Maguire retiring to sit on the beach somewhere or play golf. "Rob might get out of the fast lane, but he's not getting off the freeway," Collins said.

Market Conditions

Maguire erected downtown landmarks such as the 72-story U.S. Bank Tower, in partnership with Thomas Properties Group, and has land holdings that would accomodate up to 6.7 million square feet of office, retail and residential uses and up to an additional 6.1 million square feet of structured parking, according to Maguire's earnings report.

Housman said that the site at the corner of Figueroa and Seventh streets is an "A" location is a smart land parcel to target because it is accessible to amenities that Class A tenants want. It's within a few blocks of the $2.5 billion L.A. Live development slated to have 2,000 residential units, a 54-story hotel and condominium tower, a 7,100-seat live theater and nearly a dozen restaurants and clubs. It also would be integrated with the retail planned by Brookfield Properties Corp. at its "7+Fig" project.

However, the math doesn't add up for Housman, either. "The rents would have to be $36 triple net to get a 10 percent return," Housman said. "He may have a different formula based on what he paid for the land. He is one of the smartest guys in real estate when it comes to building quality buildings and saving on construction costs."

Rents are already that high in West Los Angeles, and Housman wonders if Maguire is betting on the 8 percent to 10 percent rent growth over the next three years, which would bring downtown rents to that level. However, some of the large blocks of space vacant in downtown buildings, such as the 500,000 square feet still vacant in the City Plaza towers, owned by Thomas Properties, would have to be absorbed before that happened.

Maguire also has large vacancies in its own buildings. The Los Angeles Unified School District moved out of its space in Maguire's 355 S. Grand Ave., putting 200,000 square feet back on the market. Sempra Energy, which leases 500,000 square feet, is also expected to downsize when its lease comes up, Collins said, which could leave as much as a 250,000-square-foot vacancy in the building.

The last wave of construction for office product in downtown Los Angeles was in 1989 and 1990, and it has taken 16 years for most of that to be absorbed, Collins said. The market had vacancy levels of more than 20 percent for most of that time, he added. And that was only tempered when whole office buildings were taken off the market and converted to residential.

"Very few big firms have made the move downtown," Collins said. "Yahoo looked and got everyone excited, but they are not coming downtown. All the growth downtown has been from firms expanding organically, not from firms relocating there."

Stock Market Prowess

Maguire just refinanced its 777 Tower building on Oct. 13 and used the $104 million proceeds and $63 million cash on hand to repay the remaining $167 million outstanding on the company's $450 million loan. Largely because of the early refinancing, Maguire Properties Funds from Operations dropped to $21.1 million in third quarter 2006, or 44 cents per diluted share, compared to $24.1 million or 55 cents per diluted share, for third quarter 2005.

"Wall Street analysts complain about excess leverage all the time," inee said. "But smart CEOs, and Rob is one of them, know that excess leverage helps you in a rising market and hurts you in a falling market. Southern California is clearly a rising market."

Maguire's decision midyear to shift away from acquiring properties and be a net seller and ramp up development had office analysts at Friedman, Billings, Ramsey & Co. upgrading the stock to outperform with a price target of $44 on Aug. 7.

"In this market, where most unlevered yields of high-quality office buildings are below the cost of debt, 5 percent versus 6 percent, acquisitions make no sense at all, unless some component of undeveloped land is involved," according to Friedman's report from analysts. "The new strategy clearly points the company in the right leverage direction."

Wall Street also has shifted away from the belief that real estate investment trusts shouldn't develop. "That may have been true in 1998," Guinee said. "But right now, it's entirely different. The REITs valued the highest are the ones with a strong development pipeline."

At the beginning, REITs were investment vehicles expected to deliver income to investors, most yielded 7 percent or higher and, it was hoped, the price appreciated, AuBuchon said. "The dynamic in the public markets has shifted," AuBuchon said. "Public markets are more comfortable with companies doing out-of-the-box stuff. REITs that have a development competency are valued at a higher level."

This is particularly true in this environment because the ability to acquire buildings is very difficult, AuBuchon said. "Development is the last area on a risk-adjusted basis with the ability to deliver higher-digit returns, and it tends to be accretive," he said.

While there is no stigma attached to REITs developing, AuBuchon does question whether this building can be developed at a return that is accretive to the cost of capital. "I still think he's dreaming," AuBuchon said.




^ Odd how the headline of the article makes things sound a lot more optimistic than what's indicated in the body of the report.

[Wright Concept]

http://www.latimes.com/news/la-me-westside18nov18,1,5807413.story

Westside office market still hot
Grubb & Ellis forecasts robust demand for the foreseeable future. Area residents say any new space will add to their huge traffic burden.
By Martha Groves
Times Staff Writer

November 18, 2006

The Westside's long-running office market boom, propelled in large part by entertainment, technology and media companies, shows no sign of abating, despite the lack of timely remedies for the area's increasingly snarled traffic.

That was the message conveyed to developers, urban planners and politicians who gathered Friday for a summit on Westside growth and economics in Santa Monica.

"The West Los Angeles office market is such a hot market that, even with the addition of people and even though drive times will be in excess of what they are today, that won't have an adverse effect," predicted Neil B. Resnick, executive vice president of Grubb & Ellis.

The specter of ever-more-crowded freeways and streets failed to dampen the optimism of many at the event.

But the prospect of continued growth in the Westside office market, along with the looming construction of thousands of apartment and condo units in Marina del Rey, Beverly Hills, Century City and Playa Vista, raised the hackles of one Westside resident.

"We have had it!" Diana Plotkin, president of the Beverly Wilshire Homes Assn., said in a telephone interview. "The infrastructure cannot handle any more development.

"Everybody wants to build on the Westside. Nobody wants to be on the Eastside or in South-Central. How wonderful will it be for the businesses that come into these wonderful buildings … when people can't get to work?"

Presenting Grubb & Ellis' 2007 forecast for the Westside office market, Resnick painted a rosy picture for commercial landlords of rising rents and declining vacancy rates. The improving fundamentals continue a trend that began in early 2004.

Westside commercial property is among the most highly sought-after investments in the country. In this year's third quarter, the area's 7.1% vacancy rate approached the lowest rate on record, 5.8% in 2000. Meanwhile, average "asking rents" are soaring throughout the region, to just under $4 a square foot in some places.

Occupying space in the market are such name-brand employers as AOL, Yahoo Inc., Fox Sports Interactive, International Creative Management and Creative Artists Agency. Grubb & Ellis said that by far the most notable deal in 2006 was the relocation of the famed William Morris Agency, which signed a lease for 150,000 square feet in a building to be erected on Beverly Drive in Beverly Hills. The 20-year term is one of the longest signed in years.

The shift to a landlord's market is in stark contrast to the soft commercial scene after the dot-com decline just a few years ago.

Now it's on the march again.

Resnick said he expects the market to remain strong for the foreseeable future. Overall, the Westside has about 51 million square feet of office space, with an additional 2 million proposed or under construction. The new space would accommodate roughly 8,000 workers.

The largest office project underway in Los Angeles County is the $275-million 2000 Avenue of the Stars project in Century City. It has pre-leased 80% of its 724,000 square feet of office space, Grubb & Ellis said.

In Hollywood, many new developments are going up, including 7046 Hollywood Blvd. and the Sunset & Vine Tower, both mixed-use projects that should help to rejuvenate the area.

Culver City developer Fredrick Smith and architect Eric Owen Moss are proposing the Conjunctive Points Theater Complex in a parking lot at Smith's Hayden Tract, a whimsically converted warehouse complex that already houses many tenants.

Residents of eastern Culver City are concerned that the increase in visitors would further congest the area.

Throughout the Westside, Grubb & Ellis said, tenants are signing long-term leases in an effort to hold rent increases at bay.

Workers flood daily into Westside office buildings. Because housing is so expensive, only about a third of the region's workers live on the Westside. That leaves more than 300,000 people a day commuting to the area, according to a Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority study.

Steve Soboroff, president of Playa Vista, who moderated a panel at the summit, chided Santa Monica for creating millions of square feet of office space without building affordable housing to go with it.

"We need housing where people work, and we need parks where people live," Soboroff said.

Further growth is on the horizon, with the MTA projecting that Westside population will rise by 15% and jobs by 23% in the next 15 years.

"I'm glad that the commercial growth is there," Laura Lake, a longtime Westwood activist, said in a telephone interview. "That's terrific. We need it. But I don't know how long we can sustain that without rolling up our sleeves and coming up with a proposal to at least mitigate part of the impact."

The MTA recently broke ground on the Expo Line, a light-rail line that will run from downtown to Culver City, with a possible extension to Santa Monica.

Transit advocates also are pushing for a subway from downtown to the beach in Santa Monica.

Such mass transit, activists say, is vital.

"The Westside desperately needs transit," said Gail Goldberg, Los Angeles' planning director.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has said building the subway is one of his top priorities.

But the idea faces many challenges, including some community opposition, and, most daunting, the hefty price tag.

The cost of subway construction is estimated at $300 million to $350 million a mile. It's roughly 13 miles along Wilshire from the subway's current western terminus at Western Avenue to the beach.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
martha.groves@latimes.com

*

Fewer vacancies

Vacancy rates in Westside office buildings have declined markedly since early 2004, indicating a robust market.

--

Quarterly office vacancy rates Q3/04 15 .2%
Q4/04 14.6%
Q1/05 13.5%
Q2/05 11.5%
Q3/05 9.9%
Q4/05 9.1%
Q1/06 8.4%
Q2/06 7.7%
Q3/06 7.1%
Source: Grubb & Ellis

[LAsam]

Just more proof that we need that damn subway to come out here to the West side!

[edluva]

the problem with using the westside office market to justify rail is that the office space is scattered over a relatively vast region. It's office-dense, but only relative to the rest of SoCal. It's still pretty scattered. No single potential rail line outside of wilshire and 405 will target that employment base well - it's a like a shot in the dark.

LA is not a place where you have a point A (suburbs) and a point B (downtown), and a need to get people in between. LA is more like commuters at A, C, X, T, Y, G, L commuting to points C, H, E, P, S, W, M respectively - of which maybe commuter A and T might use a main thoroughfaire almost exclusively (eg. Wilshire, Vermont), but the rest of whom have destinations that require long trips on minor side streets that are too scattered for mass transit, and who if they do use Wilshire or Beverly, only do so for a small leg before veering onto some small street to oblivion.

Each rail line helps the region become a tiny bit more mass-trans dependent, but until we get a more extensive, concentrated rail and more reliable bus network, we're going to be building rail lines somewhat hapazardly, catching whoever happens to need a particular route badly enough, or catching the few already over trafficked thoroughfaires there are.

Meanwhile, quality of life continues to get worse for the vast majority of us who don't find mass transit particularly useful. And that is the result of decades of completely unchecked auto-oriented growth. We like to say we're like Tokyo and London and to some degree we are. But even though those two cities are relatively decentralized vs NYC, their land uses evolved over decades around pretty extensive, concentrated rail networks and their employment bases are still very concentrated vs LAs - for example, yamanote loop travels an enormous employment base, and the central wards are still very concentrated in both employment and rail service.

LA on the other hand, evolved almost completely around the car. Yeah, we have little nodes like century city, dt, and el segundo, but honestly, the majority of our metro's 300+msf of office space consists of stand-alone office buildings in any given corner of the metro and are not within one of these "nodes" and are therefore not going to be attainable by bus or rail. A few thousand sq ft in some corner of pacoima, another couple thousand in duarte, another few thousand in Brentwood, Orange, Torrance, Garden Grove, etc - it's these developments that constitute most of that aggregate square footage - not the Glendales, the Pasadenas, and K-towns. DTLA is our biggest yet it contributes only 10% of that total. LA was very small at the time it's rail network could have had a lasting impact on land-use. So from a transit planning perspective, there are no Points A or points B to study because these points never got a chance to evolve. So now, we just have extremely busy streets (and rail lines to serve suburban politicians and their freeway-driving constituency)

Our hope is in channeling more future employment to rail corridors that are already built or are being built, away from entropic hell. Its as though we're superimposing a new city on top of a preexisting meta-city. But no new line will "improve traffic" or "improve QOL" to those who already live as they do - the majority of us. That is why rail is such a hard sell.

Sorry for the lengthy diatribe. I'm drunk and not sure if this goes under a more rail-oriented thread. Oh yeah, the office market.

[yakumoto]

Hooray, someone who may or may not build an office building...
...while I just heard of a few more IN USE office and manufacturing buildings that are being converted into housing.

[Steve2726]

I have no idea what impact this will have on this project, but here is the latest news on the developer:

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-maguire7feb07,1,49441.story?coll=la-headlines-business

Maguire no longer considering sale
From Times Staff Reports and Bloomberg News
February 7, 2007

Maguire Properties Inc., downtown Los Angeles' largest office owner, said Tuesday that it had dropped plans to consider a possible sale even as the takeover of landlords Equity Office Properties Trust and Mills Corp. had sparked bidding contests.

The L.A.-based company said it was no longer pursuing "strategic alternatives." No reason was given for the decision. Maguire said it took a fourth-quarter charge of $3.5 million, or 7 cents a share, for costs incurred to consider options.

Maguire, the owner of downtown's 72-story U.S. Bank Tower, the tallest building on the West Coast, has been the subject of takeover speculation for months. The company before Tuesday hadn't commented on reports of a possible sale in REIT Newshound and other publications. In the meantime, competition for real estate investment trust takeovers has become heated.

[colemonkee]

Here's LA Business Journal's take. Looks like they're focusing on development, but with losses, I can't imagine it would be easy to get finances for a 50-story tower. Though they do have considerable equity to borrow against.


Maguire Drops Sales Talk
By DEBORAH CROWE
Los Angeles Business Journal Staff

Maguire Properties Inc. apparently is bucking a consolidation trend in the real estate industry and has dropped plans to consider a possible sale.

The Los Angeles-based real estate investment trust, made brief mention in its fourth-quarter earnings release Tuesday that it was no longer pursuing “strategic alternatives.” Maguire, the largest owner of downtown L.A. office buildings, has been the subject of takeover speculation in the trade press for months.

“As a company we determined that the best way to serve shareholders was to maximize the value through development of the pipeline,” spokeswoman Peggy Moretti told the Business Journal, adding that the company was never “on the market.”

Maguire took a charge of $3.5 million charge in the quarter for costs related to the consideration process, according to the earnings release.

Maguire also reported that lowered expenses enabled its fourth-quarter net loss to drop to $4 million from a net loss of $7.33 million during the same quarter a year ago. Shareholders' net loss for the quarter narrowed to $8.77 million, or 19 cents a share, from $12.1 million (-27 cents). Revenue for the quarter fell 3 percent to $130 million.

[deehrler]

^ColeM..

That loss is not bad, but good. It keeps taxes down. If you add back in depreciation, they had a nice cash flow. Usually REITs of this type only show profits when they sell off a highly depreciated property after a nice gain. In between those types of events 'losses' are the norm.
MP should have no problem financing the proposed tower at first glance. Though they only show free equity at around $400 million, that figure is based on cost of properties, less depreciation. I am sure that their property portfolio would appraise much higher, which is the figure that their financiers base their judgement on.

[citywatch]

Info like this doesn't make talk about new highrise devlpt in the hood, at least of office space, sound too realistic or like it will happen well before we're old, gray & wrinkled:


In the Nov. 6 California Real Estate Journal, market watchers were puzzled by Maguire's announced decision to build a 50-story office tower in Los Angeles at 755 Figueroa St.

"It must be a dream," David AuBuchon, an analyst with St. Louis-based A.G. Edwards & Sons Inc., told the CREJ. "You can't justify building an office building in the downtown market with the rents where they are and with the space currently available, including what Maguire has vacant."

The direct vacancy rate in downtown Los Angeles was 15.3 percent in December 2006, according to Cushman & Wakefield. Maguire mirrors a high vacancy rate in its own buildings. The Los Angeles Unified School District moved out of its space in Maguire's 355 S. Grand Avenue, vacating 200,000 square feet. Sempra Energy, which leases 500,000 square feet from Maguire, is also expected to downsize when its lease expires.

:gaah:

15.3 still is pretty high, esp when you consider that's in spite of all the space that's been converted to lofts, & how long that surplus has existed in the hood to begin with.

[colemonkee]

^ColeM..

That loss is not bad, but good. It keeps taxes down. If you add back in depreciation, they had a nice cash flow. Usually REITs of this type only show profits when they sell off a highly depreciated property after a nice gain. In between those types of events 'losses' are the norm.
MP should have no problem financing the proposed tower at first glance. Though they only show free equity at around $400 million, that figure is based on cost of properties, less depreciation. I am sure that their property portfolio would appraise much higher, which is the figure that their financiers base their judgement on.
Thank you for the clarification. I hadn't considered the tax equation, and admittedly, my knowledge of standard operating procedures for REIT's is limited to what I read in newspapers/trades. Still, I don't hold out much hope that this tower will launch anytime in the next year. Hopefully I'm proven wrong. All this recent momentum might help turn the tide.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

Info like this doesn't make talk about new highrise devlpt in the hood, at least of office space, sound too realistic or like it will happen well before we're old, gray & wrinkled:




:gaah:

15.3 still is pretty high, esp when you consider that's in spite of all the space that's been converted to lofts, & how long that surplus has existed in the hood to begin with.

why would you quote old numbers when there are new ones out showing Downtown at 14.1, down yet again from the quarter before and positive absorption is up again. There were numerous reports stating that Downtown LA is making a comeback in the office market and that new construction will be feasible. Check out the LA Business Journal, they have the numbers posted in every issue and they are updated quarterly. you can compare rates, percentage from the past two quarters as well as from a year past. Downtown is definitely headed in the right direction and has been for a few quarters now. There are 3 office towers that i can think of that have been proposed recently, the Maguire tower, the 4th phase of Metropolis (if thats still alive), and the third phase of Grand Ave.

[citywatch]

^ It's hard to know which set of stats is more accurate or up to date. I've always seen different figures, depending on the source.

I believe each surveyor measures space in different ways, some including sq footage that's available through direct lease only, others inc footage that's available through subleasing, or where a former tenant has moved out before their lease has expired & wants someone else to take over the monthly rent.