Condo building breaks 2022 L.A. sales record

Long buzzed-about condominium project 8899 Beverly in West Hollywood wasted no time in setting a new benchmark on price for this year.

Unit 7BE at the development byTownscape Partners sold at its full asking price of $17.5 million, according to Brett Oppenheim of Brett Oppenheim Real Estate, who represented the buyer.

The prior high price for a condo in Los Angeles County so far in 2022 was a two-bedroom, three-bathroom unit in Santa Monica that sold for $10.5 million in March. The most expensive in Los Angeles history took place in 2010 when Candy Spelling, the widow of TV producer Aaron Spelling, spent $35 million on a penthouse condo in Century City.

The Eklund Gomes Team of Douglas Elliman represented the seller of the three-bedroom, four-bathroom unit.

Brett Oppenheim (Brett Oppenheim Real Estate)

Oppenheim identified the buyer as a private equity investor, but declined to offer any other details. He said his client was the first person to take a risk on this building. The buyer went into escrow with the unit in 2019, before a lot of the building’s construction started. The early commitment allowed the buyer to combine two units and design the floor plan of the condo. It was the right time to make such a deal, because once construction starts, it’s almost impossible to change a condo’s floor plan, Oppenheim said

“It was risky to trust that money with the developers so early–but we were convinced that it was going to be the finest condo building on the West Coast,” Oppenheim said. “The buyer picked the unit he wanted and the floor plan he wanted. We helped out the developers by giving them the confidence that someone was interested in their building early in the game. It’s difficult for developers to convince somebody when it is just a gray box.”

The high-water mark for the year wasn’t the only sale announced for 8899 Beverly, where another has gone for $8.3 million. The buyer was represented by Brian Nelson for Douglas Elliman. It is unclear when this buyer reserved a unit. The seller also was represented by the Eklund Gomes Team of Douglas Elliman.

Units at the project are being listed in phases, with one currently on the market for $7.1 million and another just released at $5.65 million–the lowest price in the building so far.

The rest of the 40-unit, 10 story building will continue to be sold in phases. The two penthouses are scheduled to go on market in June. The developer said that the two penthouses could be combined and could sell for more $100 million, which would break another condo sales record.