City Market of Los Angeles in the Fashion District downtown is suing a tenant that owes rent — to the tune of about $340,000.
City Market L.A. is a partially developed mixed-use vision that’s bounded by 9th, San Julian, San Pedro and 11th Street. It’s the brainchild of Peter Fleming, whose family co-founded what was once a produce market on the site.
City Market South, which takes up a chunk of the larger development site at the corner of 11th and San Julian Street, is owned and operated by City Market of Los Angeles and is a spot for dining and entertainment. It is the first phase of a 10-acre, mixed-use master-redevelopment plan for the century-old produce mart that now falls under Mark Levy, who signed the lease agreement included in the complaint as chief executive and president of City Market of Los Angeles. Levy was president of City Market South when Fleming made the proposal and led the plan years ago.
The agreement in the complaint names Chris Herron as lessee, but the limited liability company named as defendant is connected to film producer Todd Makurath. It could be Makurath rented the space to Herron, but the specifics are unclear. Herron co-founded craft brewery Creature Comforts — which had a residency at City Market South — but stepped down before the complaint was filed in Los Angeles Superior Court. The attorney for the plaintiff and Makurath could not be reached for comment.
Jamison’s debt
The latest clock to to start ticking in Jamison’s portfolio is a loan on City Center on 6th, a K-town mall, which went to special servicing after the loan matured and Jamison didn’t pay it off. The debt has a current balance of about $51 million.
A Jamison spokesperson said the company “engaged CBRE and signed a term sheet with a CMBS provider to refinance the matured loan, which is expected to close in 45 days,” and that “transferring the loan to the special servicer was a strategic decision in an effort to obtain an extension to work out a refinance.”
It’s not the only case of distress that has the developer playing for time. Dr. David Lee, who founded Jamison, the company his daughter Jamie Lee now runs, is the named sponsor on four loans connected to real estate in Koreatown and downtown that landed in special servicing: 811 Wilshire, Equitable Plaza, Central Plaza and City Center on 6th. The collective current balance of the special-serviced debt is about $230 million, according to Morningstar data.
Jamison entered forbearance agreements on the loans connected to Equitable Plaza and Central Plaza but faces foreclosure on 811 Wilshire after a deal to sell fell apart, per servicer commentary via Morningstar.
Too early to call
Jamison isn’t the only investor, by any means, to see its debt go to special servicing. According to Morningstar, the commercial mortgage-backed securities loan on a mall in Lakewood, once owned by Macerich, moved to special servicing. But there’s a catch — analysts suggest the transfer was more proactive than anything because the loan doesn’t mature until the summer, the mall traded hands pretty recently, and its new owners want to redevelop it.
When Macerich sold the Lakewood Center for $332 million, the price included the assumption by the joint-venture buyer of a $317 million loan on the real estate, the company said in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing dated mid-August. That loan, it said, comes due June this year. Representatives for new owners Pacific Retail Capital Partners, Lyon Living and Silverpeak did not respond to a request for comment.
Deal downtown
Downtown did not appear once in The Real Deal’s ranking of the priciest multifamily deals in Los Angeles County last year — but it looks as though things are already different as 2026 rolls out, thanks to a pricey per-unit apartment tower trade in South Park.
MetLife sold 717 West Olympic Boulevard to APW Avenue Group for about $69 million, which comes out to roughly $453,000 per apartment. On a per-unit basis, it’s more than the priciest multifamily deal all last year: Waterton’s purchase of a Woodland Hills apartment complex for about $180 million, or $345,000 per apartment. On another straight-up comparison of price per unit, the MetLife trade still trails Carmel Partners’ $141 million Marina del Rey buy, which came out to about $578,000 per apartment, and was the priciest per unit deal all 2025.
Read more
Commercial
Los Angeles
Jamison $55M Koreatown mall loan lands in special servicing
Commercial
Los Angeles
MetLife sells apartment tower downtown for $69M