Affordable housing program targets California's middle class latimes.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from latimes.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Filling the ‘missing middle’ in LA’s housing market is focus of new government program. Will it pay off? Listen 8 min MORE The Oceanaire apartment complex in downtown Long Beach was originally a luxury building, with a studio costing $2450 in rent per month. Now thanks to a government program, the same studio could cost $1841/month for some tenants. Photo by Anna Scott/KCRW. The Oceanaire apartment complex in downtown Long Beach, a short walk from waterfront, opened two years ago as a typical luxury project: sleek architecture, amenities like a 24-hour gym and jacuzzi, and rents starting around $2,450 a month for a studio.
- ADVERTISEMENT - A new state program seeks to increase the stock of housing for the so-called “missing middle” by issuing bonds to investors who buy existing market-rate buildings that are then transformed into units that a four-person household making $90,000 to $135,120 annually can afford. Lennar, the developer of the Oceanaire building Downtown, recently took advantage of this new bond program and sold the two-year-old luxury complex for $144 million to the California Statewide Communities Development Authority, which bought the building using bonds purchased by investors who are repaid through monthly rents, plus interest. The city had to sign off on the sale, as it will have to forgo property taxes for up to 30 years, but will get to keep proceeds from the future sale of the building.
- ADVERTISEMENT - The district encompasses six blocks of prime real estate Downtown, including many large stores such as Walmart, Fresh & Easy and Big 5 Sporting Goods that have sat vacant for months or years. The new development company wants to transform those spaces into mixed-use buildings with retail and residential units. “Big-box retail stores are not the highest and best use for this site,” said John Drachman, co-founder of Waterford Property Company, one of the firms involved in the purchase. “It’s better suited for more density.” Drachman noted the impact that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on retail, with more consumers shifting to online shopping.
Turnbridge Equities and Waterford Property Company Acquire City Place Long Beach in Southern California Joint venture finalizes purchase of large-scale open-air development in downtown Long Beach after previously acquiring property loan News provided by Share this article , has acquired City Place Long Beach, a 14-acre, large-scale open-air retail, office, and mixed-used development property in the heart of downtown Long Beach, California. City Place Long Beach The partnership first acquired the loan on City Place Long Beach at the end of 2020 and has now reached an agreement to take over ownership of the property. City Place has a storied history in Long Beach, having once been the home of the Long Beach Plaza Mall, an enclosed shopping mall built in 1982. The mall was demolished in 2002 to make way for City Place, an open-air shopping district anchored by several big-box tenants, emblematic of the region s large-scale retail development trends in the early 2000s. With the rise of e-commerce and emerging consumer preference for experiential brick and mortar retail, the new owners see an opportunity to reimagine City Place as a vibrant, mixed-use district.