Hackman Capital picks up industrial property near its $620M Culver Studios project

The firm has been investing hundreds of millions into studio production properties

Michael Hackman and the Hayden Tract property (Credit: The Mason Canter Group)
Michael Hackman and the Hayden Tract property (Credit: The Mason Canter Group)

UPDATED, Oct. 29, 11:52 a.m.: Hackman Capital Partners has placed another real estate bet on Culver City, where it’s building out the historic Culver Studios property as a $620 million creative office and studio campus for Amazon.

The Westside firm purchased a flex industrial property on the south end of the Hayden Tract from an entity that appears linked to Heinz Neumuller Trust, a German trust, for $40 million earlier this month, county records show. Hackman purchased the property through an entity tied to its Santa Monica Boulevard headquarters.

The roughly 2.7-acre property at 8631-8635 Hayden Place features one large building with about 72,900 square feet, including nearly 15,000 square feet of office space.

The building dates from the late 1970s and the German trust has owned the property for a little over a decade through an entity tied to its office in Santa Monica, according to property records. The property was used at one point as a set for the HBO television series “Entourage.”

Neither Hackman nor a representative for the trust immediately returned requests for comment. Santa Monica-based Heidt Torres Company managed the property.

The acquisition may play into Hackman’s wider venture into the production studio sector. The firm has acquired three massive studio production properties since 2014 and in August purchased a production management company as part of its $650 million acquisition of Manhattan Beach Studios.

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Less than a mile away from the property on Hayden Place, the firm is doubling the leasable square footage at the historic Culver Studios campus to 721,000 square feet. Amazon is leasing half a million square feet of the campus for its media production wing. Hackman added $30.2 million in construction financing from Deutsche Bank for the project this summer, bringing its total financing up to $620 million. Amazon is also leasing the office component at Hackman’s Culver Steps project.

In December, the firm closed its $750 million purchase of the CBS Television City campus in Fairfax last December. CEO and founder Michael Hackman told The Real Deal in January that the company planned to operate the property long-term.

Hackman is also developing an office property at 5500 W. Jefferson Boulevard in Culver City that Apple has signed on to lease.

The 40-acre Hayden Tract was developed by its namesake, Sam Hayden, after World War II as an industrial park. Culver City officials supported the project as a way to bolster the city’s economic base, according to Culver City News.

Culver City started a renewal effort there in the 1980s and since then several buildings have been converted over to offices and flex properties catering to media production-related companies. The north side of the area has seen the most development.

Correction: This article was updated to correct the square footage of 8631-8635 Hayden Place.