Bruce Akins

How do two brothers in their early 20s begin a home building company that two decades later is considered an industry leader? When the two are sons of a man who helped pioneer residential development in Orange County, the first guess is that they succeeded with a big boost from dad. And Carl and Bruce Akins are quick to acknowledge their debt to Ed Akins, who moved his E.B. Akins & Co. from Pacific Palisades to Tustin in 1951 and became an early tract developer in central Orange County.

While 1992 was one of the worst years on record for the Southern California home building industry, a few winners remain scattered among the bloodied and battered. One of the more successful is Irvine-based Akins, a trio of privately owned companies whose founders--brothers Bruce and Carl Akins--prefer using only their surname for corporate identity.

While 1992 was one of the worst years on record for the Southern California home building industry, a few winners remain scattered among the bloodied and battered. One of the more successful is Irvine-based Akins, a trio of privately owned companies whose founders--brothers Bruce and Carl Akins--prefer using only their surname for corporate identity.

How do two brothers in their early 20s begin a home building company that two decades later is considered an industry leader? When the two are sons of a man who helped pioneer residential development in Orange County, the first guess is that they succeeded with a big boost from dad. And Carl and Bruce Akins are quick to acknowledge their debt to Ed Akins, who moved his E.B. Akins & Co. from Pacific Palisades to Tustin in 1951 and became an early tract developer in central Orange County.

As part of ongoing consolidations in the local real estate industry, a San Francisco developer on Thursday agreed to pay $9 million in stock for the Akins Cos., a longtime, family-owned Orange County home builder. Publicly traded Catellus Development Corp., with $1.8 billion in assets and extensive land holdings, agreed to purchase the 47-year-old Akins Cos. The new company will be called Catellus Residential Group and will be based in Irvine.

Catellus Residential Group of Irvine has grabbed a stake in the Sacramento housing market, buying a two-thirds interest in Serrano Associations LLC, which is acquiring a 3,500-acre master-planned community near the state Capitol. The deal for Catellus marks its second involving a planned community in little more than a year. In 1997, the company joined Standard Pacific Corp. and Starwood Capital Group to develop the 3,510-acre Talega community in south Orange County.

Squeezed by consolidation in the home building industry, Catellus Development Corp. said Tuesday that it is considering selling its Irvine residential construction arm, one of two run by the company's Catellus Residential Group. The company also said in a press release that brothers Carl and Bruce Akins, the residential group's chairman and president, respectively, will leave the company at the end of March to pursue other opportunities.

Catellus Residential Group in Irvine has bought 10 acres in Newport Coast from the Irvine Co., and plans to build estate homes there. Catellus Residential was formed last year by the merger of Catellus Development Corp., the publicly traded development firm in San Francisco, and the Akins Cos. in Irvine. The land is the first land acquisition in Newport Coast by Catellus. "This land purchase is a milestone for Catellus," said Nelson C. Rising, president and chief executive officer of Catellus.

Donald M. Koll, who controls a growing national real estate power, said Tuesday that his company has forged a partnership with an old-line Southern California home builder that will likely construct hundreds of houses in the Bolsa Chica wetlands. The joint venture with Irvine-based Akins Cos. creates a major residential real estate force that plans to build thousands of homes worldwide.

For the second year in a row, Los Angeles-based Kaufman & Broad Home Corp. easily captured the top spot in The Times annual survey of residential building in Southern California, building almost 3,000 houses and generating revenue of more than a half-billion dollars in 1994. K&B built 2,946 single-family houses last year and sold all but 393 of them for a sales volume of $513 million, an increase of 18.2% over its 1993 revenues of $434 million.

Though regarded favorably by the real estate industry, President Bush's proposals to stimulate home buying may do little to benefit housing's long-suffering move-up market, particularly in Orange County and elsewhere in California, where high home prices and the adverse tax effects of Proposition 13 could keep potential buyers from trading up.