Site of Defunct Oil Town Slated for Development
The site of an historic Orange County oil town that died in the 1930s is about to sprout new homes.
A Placentia development company has begun selling nearly 120 acres of Brea’s rolling hills, site of the former community of Olinda, for a planned development designed to pay tribute to its heritage.
Sun-Cal Cos. is in escrow to acquire the land, owned for nearly 100 years by Houston-based Santa Fe Energy Resources Inc. and its predecessors. It is simultaneously marketing the property to local home builders.
So far, four builders have acquired options to purchase 331 of the 661 lots proposed for the Olinda Heights community near the intersection of Carbon Canyon Road and Valencia Avenue.
Santa Fe once contemplated developing Olinda Heights itself but decided its forte was the oil business, not real estate development. But it was under Santa Fe that the master plan for the entire 284-acre project was penned.
The plan calls for development of a themed community that will include moderate- and high-density residential areas, an oil museum and renovation of historic buildings on the property. Santa Fe will continue to operate about 50 underground wells there.
Builders queuing up to buy lots in the development include Greystone Homes’ Orange County division in Newport Beach, Shea Homes in Walnut, Irvine-based Sares-Regis Group and J.M. Peters Co. of Newport Beach.
Sun-Cal’s purchase of the Olinda Heights land is set to close in mid-December and the individual builders likely will close escrow on their properties in the third quarter of 1997, after the land is graded, said Todd Kurtin, a Sun-Cal principal. He said his company’s purchase of the property is being financed by an investor he declined to identify.
Olinda Heights is no small undertaking. Before the first house is built, acquisition and development costs for Sun-Cal and the participating home builders could run as high as $63 million, Kurtin said.
It is the second major oil company parcel in Orange County to come to market this year. PLC Land Co., in Newport Beach, auctioned former Chevron Oil property in the Seacliff and Seagate area of Huntington Beach this summer. Builders including Taylor Woodrow Homes in Laguna Hills and Irvine-based Polygon Communities agreed to pay top dollar for the seaside property: some of the lots fetched more than $250,000 apiece.
The Olinda Heights lots are not expected to bring those kinds of prices, but still are in demand because of the lack of competing projects in the area, builders say.
“We have always had an interest in that part of the county,” said Dennis Cullumber, Greystone’s division president. “Because of its central location, it’s almost an in-fill site” with little other new construction in the area. “We have had great success with that in the past,” Cullumber said.
