Developer behind coastal land deals eyes Hollywood project

Brian Sweeney wants to replace a bank branch with 75 market-rate apartmentsf

7800 W Sunset BLvd. in LA (Google Maps, Getty)
7800 W Sunset BLvd. in LA (Google Maps, Getty)

A Manhattan Beach developer who years ago garnered attention for a major coastal land deal is looking to make a mark on Hollywood by replacing a bank with a large apartment complex.

Brian Sweeney, through his Beach Cities-based company Retail Branches, filed plans for the five-story Sunset Boulevard project last week.

The complex would go up at 7800 West Sunset, on the west end of Hollywood, on a site that is currently occupied by a Bank of America. That one-story building went up in 1980, according to property records; Retail Branches bought the three-quarter acre property for $3.6 million in late 2021.

After demolishing the bank, Sweeney plans to build an 111,000-square-foot, five-story complex that would have 75 apartments as well as a 5,200-square-foot restaurant. The units would be all market rate, and the complex would have around 140 car parking spots and a pool.

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The project would add to a plethora of multifamily development in and around Hollywood, a neighborhood that has long ranked as one of L.A.’s most populous but more recently is tilting toward even higher residential density. Earlier this fall North Carolina-based Grubb Properties filed plans for a seven-story, 151-unit complex, while the local firm A.J. Khair filed plans for a six-story, 65-unit building.

In recent years Sweeney, a longtime investor and developer, appears to have mostly stayed under the radar, but over a decade ago he generated press attention for a major coastal land deal. Beginning around the year 2000, Sweeney began acquiring more than two dozen unbuilt parcels in the Santa Monica Mountains above Malibu, then proceeded to win various easements and development approvals, which quadrupled the land value, the L.A. Times reported in 2008. 

In late 2007 Sweeney, who had already orchestrated a similar maneuver farther up the coast, sold more than 600 acres to a conservation group, notching millions in profit.

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