Neighbors of Countrywide are nervous

From the local Lamborghini dealership to dry-cleaning shops to office cubicles, the pending sale of Countrywide Financial Corp. prompted a universal question Friday: Now what?

The troubled mortgage lender is a major presence in the business and residential corridor that straddles Los Angeles and Ventura counties on both sides of the 101 Freeway. About 600 people work in the headquarters complex in Calabasas; some 4,500 more work in various operations a few miles to the northwest in Simi Valley.

Hundreds more toil at sites scattered around the immediate area, as well as in offices throughout Southern California.

How many of those jobs will be jettisoned by Bank of America Corp., the North Carolina-based financial giant that is acquiring Countrywide for $4 billion, is unclear. But when one corporation buys another, the buyer generally is looking for cost savings, and that usually translates into job cuts.

“You just ruined my day,” dry cleaner Doug Tempo said after hearing news of Countrywide’s takeover. “Business is slow enough. I don’t need another hit. No. No way.”

Tempo, whose shop is down the street from a Countrywide office complex in Simi Valley, estimated that he has already lost about 4% of his business because of recent layoffs and transfers at the mortgage lender.

In September, Countrywide said it would cut as many as 12,000 jobs as the downturn in the housing market and chaos in the home-lending business devastated the firm’s finances.

For Countrywide employees, the takeover only deepens the uncertainty they have been dealing with for months.

“It’s better than being bankrupt,” said a technology projects employee in Simi Valley who asked not to be quoted by name. “Ideally, I would have liked it if Countrywide had survived and pulled through.”

He thinks the companies are a good fit, but conceded that “it’s still possible I won’t have a job in a month. You never know what Bank of America is going to do.”

Indeed, top Bank of America executives provided no specifics Friday about their plans for Countrywide’s 50,600-person workforce.

But Jack Kyser, chief economist at the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp., predicted that “a lot of the headquarters staff will disappear.” He expects the firm’s 228,000-square-foot home office, perched on a Calabasas hilltop and once headquarters for aerospace company Lockheed Corp., will be on the market within the year.

That would affect not only Countrywide workers who are laid off or transferred, but also the various professional companies that do business with Countrywide, such as law firms and marketing outfits, Kyser said. The new tenants also could change vendors for such mundane services as janitorial and landscaping services.

The fallout from that could further weaken the area’s wobbly real estate markets, said Delores Conway, director of USC’s Casden Real Estate Economics Forecast. She noted that earlier layoffs at mortgage firms in Orange County harmed home prices there. Commercial real estate in the Calabasas area also will suffer, she said.

“Countrywide has already had some layoffs, and you will see it reflected in the office market,” she said.

The outcome could be better in Simi Valley, Kyser said, especially if Bank of America eventually opts to expand Countrywide’s mortgage servicing and origination operations, which are considered among the best in the business.

“Sooner or later the housing market will recover, and Bank of America will be in a position to really generate a lot of business for themselves with this acquisition,” he said. “The mortgage servicing operations will stay and could actually get bigger.”

In the long run, “it could be Simi Valley’s gain.”

That would be good news for Ventura County, which was rocked in August by news that its biggest private employer, Thousand Oaks-based biotech firm Amgen, was cutting as many as 2,600 jobs.

Last year, the county’s workforce grew by a meager 0.8% – or a bit over 2,000 jobs – down from 2.3% growth in 2006.

“So the brakes got slammed on, and this does not help,” said Kyser, who is forecasting 0.2% job growth for Ventura County this year and may trim that estimate.

Simi Valley City Manager Mike Sedell said his office soon would approach Bank of America to discuss how Countywide’s loan servicing operations in his city would fit into the consolidated company.

“There’s no panic, but concern mixed with cautious optimism,” Sedell said. “We’re not looking at a potential disaster at this point. We’re looking to make lemonade out of this thing if we can.”

Sedell said there is healthy demand for office space in his city, which is home of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum, so there probably wouldn’t be a glut of vacant buildings if BofA decides to pull back.

“We’re going to make every effort we can to hold onto those jobs … . This isn’t going to happen overnight; it will take from 6 to 12 months,” Sedell said. “Hopefully, at the end of the day it will mean very little in terms of job loss.”

In the meantime, some retailers hope the area’s residents who don’t rely on Countrywide or Amgen for a paycheck will keep things humming.

“We have a lot of music producers and wealthy real estate investors out here, and they seem to be doing just fine,” said Jessica Sarmiento, manager at Calabasas Lamborghini, which sold 15 of its super luxury cars during its first month after opening last summer but only eight last month. She said the downturn may be partially due to a typical slower winter sales season.

Others are putting their faith in the prediction that Countrywide’s new owners ultimately will expand rather than contract its new possession.

Certainly, caterers from Green Acres Catering and Farm Market didn’t seem too concerned about losing their long-time customer. They were in the parking lot of Countrywide’s operations center on Simi Valley’s Tapo Canyon Road, grilling tri-tip, chicken and veggie kabobs Friday for an appreciation lunch for the lender’s employees.

“So this will be our last barbecue for Countrywide?” joked Tracy Barker, as he turned meat on the grill. “I don’t think it’ll matter … The same people are still going to be there. I don’t think it’s going to be that bad.”

andrea.chang@latimes.com

martin.zimmerman@ latimes.com Contributing to this report were Times staff writers Daniel Costello, Greg Griggs, Peter Y. Hong, Roger Vincent and E. Scott Reckard