San Diego Firm Agrees to Purchase Ellis Realty
A high-end real estate firm that operates the Prudential California franchise in San Diego County agreed Monday to acquire Ellis Realty, a similar Orange County company specializing in high-priced coastal properties.
The buyer is Pickford Realty, whose chief executive, Steve Games, has built a strong business under the Prudential name in San Diego County communities such as La Jolla, Rancho Santa Fe and Coronado.
Games said he expects to spend 10 days going over the books of Newport Beach-based Ellis in detail. The deal is expected to close early next month.
Terms weren’t disclosed. Games said there had been other bidders and he paid “at least market value” for Ellis because it fit so well with his business.
Ellis has offices in La Jolla, Rancho Santa Fe and University City in San Diego County, along with Orange County offices in Newport Beach, Laguna Beach (north and south), Laguna Niguel, San Clemente, Dana Point, the Balboa Peninsula and Mission Viejo.
As the wave of industry consolidations is wrapping up, the market for high-end Southern California homes is taking off again with buyers around the world, Games said.
“We feel this is the golden coast, and the most beautiful place in the world,” Games said. “And we’ll have huge market share.”
Analysts expect Games eventually to convert Ellis, currently operating as a Better Homes & Gardens franchise, to a Prudential franchise. Jon Douglas, who operates several Prudential franchises in Orange County, has announced his intent to go independent. Ellis “is definitely going to become a Prudential operation one way or the other,” said Patrick Veling, a partner in the Fullerton consulting firm Dynamic Marketing Resources, which advised Games on the deal.
Games said he wouldn’t rule out such a switch sometime in the future.
Ellis was one of four residential firms sold by Grubb & Ellis, a national brokerage that stumbled and retrenched into its core commercial real estate business.
“It was one of the nonstrategic businesses that was eating up our precious resources,” said investor Joe F. Hanauer, who was chairman of Grubb & Ellis when the sale occurred in November 1994.
It was sold to a group financed largely by 1-Day Paint & Body Centers tycoon Javier Uribe, who was instrumental in the decision to sell to Games, sources said.
Veling said the deal gives Games a powerful position in San Diego County, but farther north the residential real estate business remains fragmented.
“There are still too many real estate companies trying to sell too few homes in coastal Orange County,” Veling said.
