Results tagged “realestate”

That's the current economy for you. Own a lot of property and Forbes Magazine will catch on in their most recent 400 wealthiest Americans list. Developer Ed Roski Jr., CEO of Majestic Realty Company, dropped from No. 163 to No. 236 on the annual list, which has one sports consultant speculating trouble for the proposed NFL stadium in the city of Industry.

Crazy Gideon's crazy videos were always fun to watch with his yelling and the throwing of electronics around his downtown warehouse (never seen them? watch a collection below, they're great). But the times have changed and Gideon Kotzer has installed a "Going out of Business" sign on his Arts District-located warehouse, which he plans to convert into housing. Ed Fuentes of blogdowntown catches up with Kotzer in this great video.

It's been a rough few years for the Clinton family, who remain the owners and operators of the last of their once-booming set of cafeteria eateries in Los Angeles, Clifton's Cafeteria. It was just three years ago that the death of Jean Clinton Roeschlaub, described as the cafeteria family's heiress, was ruled homicide; the 83-year-old who was thought to be the heart and soul of the restaurant was found dead inside her penthouse apartment.

Los Angeles has thousands of miles of failed sidewalks. Buckled, cracked, missing chunks or completey destroyed, the problem leaves the city paying out $2 to $4 million in trip and fall lawsuits each year. The city's budget only provides for fixing less than one hundred miles a year leaving residents on a wait list for 83 years to have their sidewalk fixed.

CurbedLA shares this good-news bit for preservationists and fans of Fatburger, and report that the original 1952 South LA stand where the popular fast food franchise began has been purchased by the CRA and will be preserved and made a part of the new development on the property. According to family rep Frank Evanisko," The actual shack still on the property cannot be torn down but must be rehabbed and incorporated into any new development." The site is destined to be for low income housing; public records indicate "the proposed project will be a 66-unit moderate income housing condominium consisting of 61 residential condominiums and five Live/Work units at 3001-3023 S. Western Avenue." Fatburger was founded by "female African American entrepreneur Lovie Yancey." Yancey died at age 96 in February 2008.

For the right buyer, a piece of $15 million Frank Lloyd Wright history could be theirs. The famous Ennis House, tucked up in the hills above Los Feliz, has sat quiet, unopened to the public as a non profit tried to bring it back. About $5 to $7 million is what they needed, but they never got and now it's for sale. "Our goal has always been to be a good steward of the house. We've made a lot of progress, but at this point a private owner with the right vision and sufficient resources can better preserve the house than we can as a small nonprofit," said Ennis House Foundation's president, James DeMeo. Just last week, LAist presented a feature history piece on the home.

Foreclosed homes feelings oft beget strong feelings and emotions for owners, but this Riverside man took it way too far. Says the LA Times: "A U.S. Bank representative was checking the house Tuesday in the 1400 block of Orange Street when he discovered several explosives outside the structure. Officers from the Riverside Police Department arrived about 2:45 p.m. and confirmed the explosives were made to look like pipe bombs, officials said in a statement." Daniel Gherman, 42, was booked on several counts.

Residents of Malibu are up in arms about U2 guitarist The Edge (nee David Evans) and his plans "to build five luxury homes in [the] hills" they believe "would devastate the area," according to On the Red Carpet.

With the market so down, some are jumping into the ownership game. Via wire reports printed in the Daily Breeze: "A total of 4,590 homes sold in February, up from 3,468 for February 2008, while the median price of a home in Los Angeles County last month was $299,000, down from $460,000 in the same month a year ago, according to La Jolla-based MDA DataQuick. In Orange County, the median home price was $375,000, down 27.9 percent from the February 2008 median of $520,000, according to DataQuick. A total of 1,879 homes were sold in the county last month, up 27.7 percent from the 1,471 home sales in February 2008."

They tend to be our least favorite people, since we write hefty checks to them every month for our rent, but landlords aren't doing so well these days. Vacancies in commercial buildings are up and rising, say recent reports, and this year looks to be a tough one for landlords looking to lease.

The supergraphic saga continues and the LA Times is taking numbers. The CIM Group is beginning to take down five illegal supergraphics that they thought were legal, even though the company signed a contract stating they couldn't put up supergraphics. The real estate group has been given $28 million in taxpayer subsidies for redevelopment projects in Hollywood and other neighborhoods and is seeking permission for 11 supergraphics on a large new shopping center project in Mid-City on Pico Boulevard.

Hollywood's Cherokee Studios is poised to re-emerge as an innovative LEED-certified work/live space this year. The site itself is steeped in local music history; recording artists ranging from Frank Sinatra to David Bowie laid down tracks inside the walls, and before that it was home to movie's Republic Studios. After over 30 years of proprietorship, the Robb brothers closed the doors to the legendary studios in 2007, but now the REthink Development team is finalizing work on the space, which will now be called the Cherokee Lofts and will hopefully be legendary in its own time.

Of the 79 units being auctioned off last night at the Rowan Lofts in Downtown Los Angeles, 63 of those found new potential owners, finds Curbed LA who was there: "The most expensive unit sold today was a penthouse that was originally priced at $785,000--it sold for $534,000. The minimum bid on that unit was $490,000. The three least expensive units sold for $207,000--two were originally priced at $335,000 and one at $317,900, respectively, and had minimum bids of $195,000." The 63 number could change as some people may drop out of the process.

by Jack Skelley

Thinking about kicking off 2009 by buying a home? It seems prices are falling month after month, but you may be interested to know where the biggest price drops are happening around Los Angeles. Real Estate website Redfin put together their monthly index of rate-drops and compiled some charts representing area cities and towns as well as L.A. neighborhoods to help potential buyers, or the just plain curious, see where things are getting cheaper. They explain that the charts "show the percent of MLS, FSBO or REO listings that were price-reduced at some point before leaving the market (either sold or removed unsold from the market) in the past 90 days," excluding areas too small to provide helpful data. (A full ranking of areas is available to download from their site, too.)

He might be needing to move on from his fantasy-driven life on his legendary Santa Barbara estate, but Michael Jackson still knows how to do things in style. The onetime "King of Pop" recently moved into a Bel Air home for the totally reasonable price of $100k a month rent. The home, according to the LA Times, is "a French chateau estate built in 2002" and "has seven bedrooms, 13 bathrooms, 12 fireplaces and a theater" but, there is "nary a Ferris wheel or exotic animal in sight."

Wednesday, a report from Cal State Fullerton told the health and economic risks of air pollution in Central and Southern California. And now this sobering news from a UC Berkely report, as told by the LA Times: "For the first time, the costs of global warming's projected effects in the nation's largest state have been quantified: About $2.5 trillion of real estate assets in California are at risk from extreme weather events, sea level rise and wildfires, with a projected annual price tag of between $300 million and $3.9 billion, according to a new report, "California Climate Risk and Response," written by UC Berkeley researchers Fredrich Kahrl and David Roland-Holst."

Wanna buy a historic Hollywood theatre? Well, the El Capitan is rumored to have been put on the market today, with a price tag of $31 million. The purchaser will have a ready-made tenant, namely Walt Disney Co., and can boast they own a key piece of the entertainment industry, old and new.

Actor and producer (okay, and sometimes director) Kevin Spacey has purchased a unit in Downtown's Biscuit Lofts for a cool $1.2 million.

The LAPD is reporting the suspicious disappearance of a Brentwood real estate agent who has not been seen since September 3 in his home on Sunset Blvd. "Williamson is a real estate agent and had been scheduled to attend a very important business meeting on Thursday, September 4th" said the LAPD in a statement. "He failed to show up for that meeting and has uncharacteristically failed to contact his family or business associates."

A historic piece of property has just gone up for sale: The redwood hangar where eccentric millionaire and aviation icon Howard Hughes (pictured) built and housed the "Spruce Goose." The hangar was set up in the early 40s when Hughes was awarded a wartime government contract, and, according to the LA Times, "is now used mainly for movie and television shoots." It is located in what is now the Playa Vista Development. In 1998, when work began on the site for Playa Vista, plans were to incorporate the 11 Hughes buildings on the premises as part of "the Campus at Playa Vista, a new entertainment, media and technology complex."

Late last month, Tribune Company chairman and CEO Sam Zell said in a memo that he was considering selling the iconic Times Mirror Square (along with the Tribune Tower in Chicago). If it does sell, Zell says moving out won't be immediate (they could sell and lease back some of the space), but come five years down the road, moving day may arrive.

Is Westwood making a comeback? The LA Times thinks so, in today's article on the burgeoning real estate development in UCLA's backyard. But isn't this a story we've heard a million times before? It goes something like this: Westwood used to be a great pedestrian area, then it fell victim to gang violence in the late 80's, and it's never been the same since. But maybe there's hope yet -- at least, that's what developers are hoping.

On Glendon Avenue, a block east of Westwood Boulevard, the first of an anticipated 700 tenants have moved into the 350-unit Palazzo Westwood Village even as workers scurry to complete the project. Nearby on Lindbrook Drive, the former site of a Flax art supply store, developer Kambiz Hekmat has broken ground on an "extended stay" boutique hotel that will have shops and restaurants. A modernist retail project from developer Ron Simms is planned at the site of the recently razed 1,100-seat Mann National Theater, where "The Exorcist" had its Los Angeles opening in 1973.

Santa Monica's Pacific Park ferris wheel has a new owner, thanks to an eBay auction that ended at noon yesterday.

Photo of bungalows in Monrovia by Living in Monrovia via Flickr

On the heels of the recent SoCal beef recall and a property being sold abut the Hollywood Sign, PETA announced an idea yesterday of buying or, at least, renting the next-door land to place 5-letters to the left of the Hollywood sign. If all becomes said and done (they wish), Hollywood's icon would read "Go Veg Hollywood."

The relationship between real estate and the Hollywood Sign is as old as, well, the sign itself. Built in 1923 as a promotional billboard to attract buyers to make their homes in the hills of the burgeoning Hollywood community, the sign that once read "HOLLYWOODLAND" has become one of the most iconic landmarks in LA. Now real estate and the sign have a new possibility: 138 acres of land once owned by Howard Hughes that sits west of the "H" in the sign is up for sale for a cool $22 million.

Can we now add eating habits to the long list of modern relationship deal-breakers? The New York Times published a pre-Valentine's Day article this morning discussing the difficulties couples face when their diets are dramatically different:

Ben Abdalla, 42, a real estate agent in Boca Raton, Fla., said he preferred to date fellow vegetarians because meat eaters smell bad and have low energy.

Continue reading "He's Just Not That Into You...And Your Meat"