RESIDENTIAL REAL ESTATE : Canada Is Back: Building a Monarch in Laguna Niguel

In the late 1970s, Canadian building companies flush with cash from their country’s economic boom swarmed into Southern California to take advantage of this area’s building frenzy as well.

By 1983, as the dust settled from the collapse of the Southland banking and real estate industries, most of the Canadian firms were gone.

Now some of them are coming back.

As bad as the recession and building bust have been here, things in Canada are even worse. The jobless rate there is 11.2%, compared with 7.2% in the United States last month.

The latest Canadian entry into the post-recession Orange County market is Monarch Development Corp., a Toronto-based builder that is celebrating both its 75th birthday and its first California venture this year.

The project is a tract of 62 luxury homes in Laguna Niguel expected to sell for $350,000 or more.

Monarch, which has established an Orange County office under longtime local builder Gordon Craig, plans to build the homes in the planned community of Marina Hills.

It is a British Commonwealth project of sorts. Marina Hills’ master developer is Taylor Woodrow Homes U.S.A., a subsidiary of the giant British builder Taylor Woodrow PLC--which is majority owner of Monarch.

Craig, general manager for Monarch’s new California division, had been a Taylor Woodrow regional project manager.