As development in the City of Angels drags along — especially in multifamily — the city’s top general contractors have still managed to keep the excavators digging and the workers hanging drywall.
The top general contractors working in the city, based on both the estimated cost of their ongoing projects and their square footage, had their hands in commercial construction, perhaps unsurprising in a city where large-scale residential development is so famously difficult.
To get a handle on which L.A. builders were most active over the past few years, The Real Deal, for the first time, analyzed building permits issued by the City of Los Angeles from May 1, 2020 through May 22, 2023 for new buildings, additions and alterations. The 146,000 projects include single-family homes, duplexes, multifamily and commercial buildings.
From the data, we created two rankings: one by the total square footage of their projects and another by the total estimated cost of each contractor’s projects (a figure which can often skew low on permit applications).
Hensel Phelps Construction topped the list by price tag, with more than $1 billion worth of construction in the works. Most of that total is from the firm’s role as the prime contractor for the massive and ongoing transformation of the terminals at Los Angeles International Airport. The Colorado-based contractor specializes in aviation construction and also builds medical and life-science facilities and even amusement parks and resorts.
Shapell Homes — a unit of homebuilder Toll Brothers — came in a distant second with just over $433 million worth of projects going up. PCL Construction Services followed close behind with more than $415 million.
Wilshire Construction and Onni Contracting rounded out the top five by project cost. Their totals were significantly lower than the top three, at about $288 and $286 million, respectively.
The majority of Onni’s total came from a single huge project, the 54-story, mixed-use tower going up in Downtown at 230 West Olympic Boulevard on the corner of Hill Street. It’s the biggest residential project under way in the city, with 685 units, and the second-largest development overall, after the $300 million Johnson Fain-designed high-rise going up at 1950 South Avenue of the Stars in Century City, which will serve as Creative Artists Agency’s new headquarters.
Ranked by total square footage under construction, the top firms shuffle a bit.
PCL Construction took the top spot by a wide margin with over 6 million square feet in projects underway. As with Hensel Phelps, PCL owes its chart-topping numbers to work at LAX. The vast majority of its square footage total is from its work on the airport’s sprawling Landside Access Modernization Program, which includes a two-mile automated train system and consolidated parking facilities.
PCL Construction said it focuses on clearing the way for developers to give them and their financiers the confidence to move forward with major projects in unsteady times.
“We’re seeing challenges mainly due to uncertainties about when to greenlight projects,” said Aaron Yohnke, senior vice president of PCL’s California buildings operations. “Clients are dealing with concerns over financing, escalating costs, inflation, and supply shortages, which can lead to extended timelines.”
The firm emphasizes preconstruction agreements with suppliers to forecast costs accurately and make delivery timelines more predictable, he said.
Shapell Homes came in second in this ranking as well. It has nearly 3.8 million square feet under construction spread across more than 1,000 single-family homes within the L.A. city limits.
Multifamily specialist Wilshire Construction ranked third by total floor area, with over 2.6 million square feet under construction. Fellow multifamily builder Walton Construction came in fourth with nearly 2 million square feet of apartments going up, and W.E. O’Neil Construction — which builds lots of multifamily projects but is also elbow-deep in airport renovations — rounded out the top five with nearly 1.7 million square feet under construction.