Construction: Latest Project Up North for Local Developer
A San Diego-based developer interested in building a $60 million office campus has reached agreement to buy nearly 20 acres in South Orange County.
The deal, expected to close by the end of May, is the first step in plans by the Douglas Allred Co. to develop some 350,000 square feet of low-rise space at A.J. West Ranch in Lake Forest.
“We’ve been looking at this site for about five years,” said David Allred, the company’s executive vice president. “We’ve just been waiting for an opportunity to develop it.”
The company expects to use its own financing on the five-building, 19.83 acre office.
Allred said his firm, which was started by his father more than three decades ago, also is developing industrial, office and apartment projects in Orange County as well as in other markets.
The company is finishing its $17 million Allred Irvine Center, a flex office park with 120,000 square feet expected to be done by mid-May. Nine of the park’s 17 buildings are already under contract to be sold, according to Allred.
“We have an appetite for more in Orange County,” he said. “This is a very exciting market and we continue to look at other opportunities.”
At A.J. West Ranch, Allred expects the five new office buildings to be taken by anywhere from one to three large tenants.
Lease rates haven’t been determined yet. But Griffin and Allred say the price tag for space in the new office complexes will be competitive with other projects in South Orange County. Current asking rental prices for similar types of buildings in the area are around $1.40 to $1.45 a square foot, according to brokers.
The Douglas Allred Co. is also under way with developing 1.5 million square feet of industrial buildings in Phoenix.
“We’ve done about 1 million square feet in that market during the last three years,” Allred said. The Douglas Allred Co. also has been active in the Jacksonville, Fla., area as well as in Orange County.
It is also building residential space near its base in San Diego.
“We’ve been building homes in the $3 million to $4 million range in Rancho Santa Fe,” Allred said. “Those are custom units that we do from time-to-time. But those types of projects aren’t what we consider our main thrust.”
Commercial and industrial development, along with projects connected with different apartment markets, remains the focus of The Douglas Allred Co., he added.
Coleman is a reporter with the Orange County Business Journal.