Project’s Site, Traffic Flow Produce Success
A good location and an advantageous traffic flow almost always produce a very successful real estate project.
The SAVI Ranch Business Park in north Orange County is a current example.
Steve Roy, associate vice president of Coldwell Banker, who heads the project’s leasing team, said traffic flow has proven to be a strong marketing tool for the development.
“It has been a gradual process to educate users to the benefits of a location which takes advantage of the reverse flow of heavy traffic from central and southern areas of the county and also of the enormous labor pool accessible from affordable housing in north Orange County and the Inland Empire communities.”
Almost $4 million in leases have been signed within the past month at SAVI Ranch Business Park as the result of a marketing consortium formed in early summer by its four major developers to create this awareness.
The park, a master-planned business center at the Weir Canyon Road exit of California 91, was started in 1984 as a master-planned project of SAVI Ranch Associates/Hillman Properties West with additional development by the Koll Co., O’Donnell Brigham & Partners/Southern and Pacesetter Business Properties.
Touted in an aggressive marketing campaign for its high-style technology buildings, broad landscaped streets, acres of parking, restaurants and a proposed hotel, the 200-acre “self contained corporate environment” is moving on schedule on various construction fronts. When complete, the business park’s buildings will have in excess of three million square feet.
The portion of the park now being developed is in the city of Yorba Linda; a portion for later development is in Anaheim.
Already in place is the first phase of the Koll SAVI Business Center, a $20-million, 24-acre research and development center, a joint venture of Koll Co. and the Principal Financial Group. The first stage consists of six buildings, ranging from 15,000 to 50,000 square feet for a total of 160,000 square feet.
Other completed projects are two Hillman buildings, providing 16,500 and 17,500 square feet; two R & D buildings by Pacesetter Business Properties, and 350,000 square feet in four buildings by O’Donnell Brigham & Partners/Southern; all projects represent first phases on these developers’ landholdings.
With completion of the Koll project, more than 650,000 square feet in new buildings are now available at SAVI Ranch, according to John K. Alstrom, vice president of Hillman Properties West Inc., Newport Beach, the park’s developer with Hardie Setzer, owner of the assets of the Santa Ana Valley Irrigation Co., which included the SAVI ranch land.
Presently under construction is North County Business Center, Pacesetter Business Properties’ second SAVI development, consisting of a $7-million, 107,000-square-foot complex of three buildings.
Designed by Howard F. Thompson & Associates of Irvine, it offers multi-tenant space from 6,000 to 9,000 square feet, a size which is much sought after in today’s market, according to Steve Strauss, vice president of Pacesetter.
Hillman will break ground in December on the first of four planned restaurants in the park, a 7,000-square-foot Hershel’s delicatessen. Alstrom indicated that negotiations are nearing completion for two other eating facilities.
Additionally, a hotel to be operated by Doubletree/Compri is in the planning stages for development by Hillman in joint venture with McCarthy, a Newport Beach-based diversified construction and development firm.
The six-story, 174-room facility, to be located immediately adjacent to the Riverside Freeway, is expected to be under construction by March of 1987.
Coldwell Banker Commercial Real Estate Services, land sales and leasing agent for the park, reports that the first tenants will be moving this month into two of the park’s existing projects.
Zeus Components Inc., a branch of Zeus Corp. of Port Chester, N.Y., has leased 40,000 square feet in Pacesetter’s North County Tech Center and will consolidate its operations in Mira Loma, Anaheim and Tustin in the new facility.
Selectronics Communications Inc., is moving its corporate headquarters and sales offices from Anaheim to a 14,700-square-foot building in Koll SAVI Business Center.
