Business Park Developer Banks on a Race for Space in County
Agoura Hills real estate developer Richard Darling likes to peer over the Conejo Grade every once in a while. He enjoys the view of western Ventura County--what he sees reminds him a lot of the Conejo Valley 10 years ago.
But the vision is bringing back more than memories. It seems to be inspirational as well.
A decade ago, Darling was building industrial parks in the Conejo Valley. Now, he is busy developing his first business park on the other side of the Grade.
“We built some industrial buildings in the Conejo Valley in the 1980s, and at the time, prices there were like prices are now in Oxnard,” Darling said. “In the intervening 10 years, the market has moved.”
Darling and his partners in Del Norte Holding have finished the grading on an $8-million, 8.85-acre industrial park within Oxnard’s 294-acre McInnes Ranch development. Construction on the project, dubbed the Darling Business Park, is scheduled to be completed by early 1999.
Del Norte Holding acquired the land earlier this summer from the United Parcel Service.
“This is my first development in Ventura County in some time,” Darling said. “I think it’s very timely and appropriate to be here now. Even when Los Angeles County was suffering in ’95 and ‘96, Ventura County was showing economic progress. We noticed that, so we had been looking for a project, primarily industrial in nature.”
Darling’s decision to purchase property in Oxnard was influenced by a variety of factors.
“There are quality-of-life issues--companies locate where the owners and CEOs want to live,” he said. “And Ventura County has moderate climates, good schools and low crime.”
And from an investment standpoint, he said, the timing may turn out to be ideal.
“With the new [SOAR] initiatives pending on the ballot in November, if they’re successful you are going to find even less industrial supply of land, and that’s going to make anything anybody has out here more valuable. We think the long-range outlook for the product is good.”
The 125,000-square-foot business center will accommodate up to 35 tenants occupying spaces of 1,800 to 10,000 square feet.
“This will be more general manufacturing and distribution than a high concentration of office space,” said Harry Preston, the CB Richard Ellis real estate agent handling the leasing of the facility. “It’s a real industrial building.”
Preston, who facilitated Del Norte’s acquisition of the property from UPS, said pre-leasing in a structure of this type is uncommon. But he expects plenty of interest once construction is completed.
“The smaller [industrial business owners] like to touch the building, see it, feel it,” he said. “I have kept an unofficial survey of my competitive product around the Oxnard area, and vacancy is less than 2% in this niche. You drive around Oxnard right now and you see a heck of a lot of construction, but that’s all big stuff. We’re going after the little guys.”
McInnes Ranch, developed in 1987, houses a number of industrial operations including the Templock Corp., Western Saw, Viking Trucking, Fresh Prep and Blois Construction.
