Shaul Kuba, Richard Ressler and Avi Shemesh’s CIM Group sold an 11-acre West Hollywood studio campus to its favorite client: itself.
CIM CFO David Thompson signed the deal to trade the recently revamped 107-year-old complex known as The Lot at Formosa for $229.8 million to The Lot in West Hollywood, a Delaware shell company it controls, according to Los Angeles County property records and a source with knowledge of the deal.
Blue Sky Servicing, a lender registered to the same Wilshire Boulevard address as CIM, provided a $155 million loan for the acquisition, property records show. The new lender appears to be a sidecar vehicle that allowed CIM to pay off a $150 million loan from a private debt fund linked to global investment firm AllianceBernstein, according to a release signed by AllianceBernstein after the property traded hands.
A spokesperson for CIM described the sale as a “recapitalization” and noted that it was approved by an “independent committee” within the company.
HBO, which filmed 2010s prestige television hits “True Blood,” “Big Little Lies” and “Euphoria” at The Lot, made it its long-term home in West Hollywood in 2021, when it signed on for 161,108 square feet of production space at the property, as The Real Deal previously reported.
And Miramax, the production company founded by former Hollywood producer and convicted sex offender Harvey Weinstein, recently followed suit. It signed a 16,000-square-foot deal to make The Lot its new headquarters in January, CIM announced.
The campus, at 1041 North Formosa Avenue, comprises seven sound stages and offices spanning a full block on Santa Monica Boulevard. CIM has owned the property since 2007 and recently added three new office buildings and two parking garages, according to the company.
Global investment firm AllianceBernstein provided a $150 million loan tied to the property last May, property records show. The lender released CIM from that debt after the deal with Blue Sky Servicing.
The mysterious new lender cropped up in Hollywood last year, when it provided a $300 million construction loan for a new studio complex at 5601 West Santa Monica Boulevard.
The source with knowledge of the deal, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said CIM’s sidecar deal was backed by hard money lender Hankey Capital.
Hankey Capital’s founder, Don Hankey, reached by phone, declined to comment on his firm’s involvement.