Cabi to buy 33 office buildings in SoCal
Mexican real estate company Cabi Developers has agreed to buy 33 office buildings in Southern California for $1.5 billion, thus establishing itself as a player in the competitive regional property investment arena.
Cabi will acquire office buildings in Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego counties from Arden Realty Inc. in a deal expected to close in July.
The transaction is the latest in a series of office portfolio sales that have seen large collections of properties change hands as investors scramble for shares of the improving regional office market.
The Arden office buildings are properties that the company considered “noncore assets,” Arden said. Los Angeles-based Arden intends to use some of the sale proceeds to buy more buildings and expects to spend as much as $1 billion by the end of the year.
Cabi is part owner of a few buildings in Southern California, but this would be its first outright purchase here, said Rich Mayo, who is in charge of acquisitions for Cabi’s Los Angeles office.
“Southern California has one of the strongest economies in the world and is a great place to invest,” Mayo said. “It also has a lot of cultural synergies with Mexico. It’s a familiar place.”
More investments are in the works, Mayo said. “Our goal is to have several significant transactions under our belt in the next several months.”
Miami-based Cabi is a subsidiary of GICSA, one of the largest developers in Mexico, and also has properties in Texas, Nevada and Florida.
Among the office properties Cabi is buying from Arden are Century Park Center, a 16-story building at 9911 W. Pico Blvd. in Los Angeles. It also is acquiring the three-story Beverly Atrium at 350 S. Beverly Drive in Beverly Hills and the low-rise Fountain Valley Plaza at 10540 Talbert Ave. in Fountain Valley.
