JV Plans 4,000 Affordable Units in L.A., Starting With Former World Trade Center

A day before a major California housing bill goes into effect on July 1, two prominent commercial real estate firms announced a partnership to build thousands of new apartments in Los Angeles.

Global investment firm Kennedy Wilson and Jamison, perhaps L.A.’s most active adaptive reuse firm, on Tuesday launched a joint venture with plans for 4,000 affordable housing units across the city.

Specifically, the partnership is between Jamison’s new affordable housing subsidiary, Arden Residential, and Kennedy Wilson’s affordable housing development partnership, Vintage Housing.

The new joint venture will start in August by converting the former L.A. World Trade Center in Downtown L.A. The 400,000-square-foot office complex at 350 South Figueroa Street will be converted to what the JV is calling Sky Castle, with 512 affordable housing units, including one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments.

The first phase of the project will include changing the concourse levels into 241 units for families earning 30 percent to 80 percent of area median income. The second phase will convert the office tower above into 271 affordable units.

California’s SB 79 goes into effect on July 1 to force city leaders to allow more multifamily development near mass transit stops, encouraging projects that can be up to nine stories high. However, L.A.’s lawmakers chose to delay the full implementation until 2030, and until then will allow new SB 79 projects to be only four stories on significantly fewer parcels.

Jamison said it manages 18 million square feet of commercial office, retail, medical and multifamily properties throughout Southern California, and it has added more than 8,000 units since 2014, with an additional 2,000 units under construction. Kennedy Wilson has $36 billion of assets under management.

Gregory Cornfield can be reached at gcornfield@commercialobserver.com.