Carmel Partners grabs stalled Casden site in West LA for $50M

A rendering of the Casden West LA project
A rendering of the Casden West LA project

San Francisco-based Carmel Partners snapped up a West Los Angeles development site for $49.5 million from a real estate investment firm headed by Beverly Hills developer Alan Casden, according to Real Capital Analytics.

Casden acquired the site, at 11122 W. Pico Boulevard, for $42 million in 2007, and planned to build a 595-unit multifamily complex with 15,000 square feet of commercial space.

The project faced opposition from neighbors who worried about increased traffic in the neighborhood. They accused him of illegally using property owned by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to calculate the development’s potential size. Plans to include a supermarket and a Target at the project were nixed.

Ron Zeff

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Last April, a longtime cement plant on the still-vacant site, which is next to an Expo Line light rail station, was demolished, paving the way for the project to proceed.

Casden Properties declined to comment on the sale, saying simply that the developer was no longer involved with the site.

A spokesperson for Carmel, headed by Ron Zeff, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on plans for the property.

Carmel recently completed another mammoth multifamily project, known as Eighth & Grand, in Downtown L.A. The property, which sits on three acres of land at 770 South Grand Avenue, has 700 units in total and in anchored by Downtown’s first Whole Foods.