Office Buildings

A powerful and prolonged earthquake rocked Mexico on Tuesday, toppling houses near the epicenter in the south, cracking building facades in this sprawling capital and briefly terrifying a population well schooled in natural disasters. Despite the quake's 7.4 magnitude, however, there were no reports of serious injury, according to President Felipe Calderon and officials across the country. Aftershocks rattled the area through the rest of the day. "This is one of the strongest we've ever felt," said Calderon, who urged Mexicans to remain calm.

With the economy apparently stabilizing, commercial real estate investors have jumped into several markets in the West, brokers said. “There is a lot of capital that needs to get out,” said broker Kevin Shannon of CBRE Group Inc. “People have fresh allocations for both debt and equity and … want to put it to work.” The hottest markets for buyers in search of Class A office buildings are Seattle and San Francisco, he said, but...

A man who stabbed four people in a Columbus, Ohio, office building was shot by police and critically wounded as he tried to flee, authorities said Wednesday. Police received a call at 12:40 p.m. reporting a stabbing at the 27-story downtown building, known as the Continental Centre, which includes offices for the Ohio attorney general, AT&T and a technical school.  The suspect walked into the ground floor lobby of the Miami-Jacobs Career College and stabbed the first victim, Columbus police spokesman Sgt. Rich Weiner told The Times.

Growing demand from creative businesses such as post-production, new media, advertising and technology firms resulted in the greatest net absorption of creative office space on Los Angeles County's Westside in 2011 since the start of the recession, a report said. Last year, more than 500,000 square feet of offices were taken off the market, the highest annual net absorption since 2006 and a 32% increase over 2010, real estate brokerage Industry Partners said. The firm describes creative space as an adaptive reuse of an existing commercial or industrial building predating 1970 or new construction meant to convey a similar look and feel.

Mariner's Mile Marine Center, a nautical landmark in Newport Beach, has been acquired by a local investor for $25 million, real estate brokers said. The property at 2429-2507 West Coast Highway holds five New England-style buildings that date to the 1960s. Mariners Mile holds offices and shops as well as a shipyard and large boat slips, said broker Mark Larson of Lee & Associates Investment Services Group. One of the boats docked there is the Wild Goose, a minesweeper-turned-yacht once owned by actor John Wayne and now operated by Hornblower Cruises.

A large residential complex in Santa Clarita's town center with a mix of apartments and condominiums has been sold for $56.65 million to Los Angeles real estate investors. Decron Properties Corp. bought Madison at Town Center, which in real estate parlance is a "broken condo" complex where some of the units are owned and others are rented. Mixed ownership at the Madison occurred when owners attempted to convert the upscale apartment complex to condos during the last real estate boom.

A joint venture of Oakfield Realty Partners and Long Wharf Real Estate Partners has acquired three office buildings in the Warner Center district of Woodland Hills for $26.4 million. Oakfield, a privately held commercial real estate investment firm based in Los Angeles, bought 5950 Canoga Ave., 5955 De Soto Ave. and 21155 Califa St. for about $145 per square foot, real estate broker Bob Safai of Madison Partners said. Long Wharf is a Boston private equity real estate manager. The identity of the seller was not released, but real estate data provider CoStar identified the last owner as New York lender-based Guggenheim Commercial Real Estate Finance.

Newport Beach officials recently ordered a real estate investor to stop gutting the interior of an office building designed by celebrated Modernist architect Richard Neutra. It is the latest dispute concerning the Mariners Medical Arts building, a sleek 1963 complex at 1901 Westcliff Drive saved from demolition in 2009. Preservationist John Linnert, a Costa Mesa architect, noticed crews working on the upstairs interior in January and reported them to the city planning staff.

In a move to shed nonessential assets, Bank of America will sell and lease back some of its administrative office space. Only three office buildings — two in North Carolina and one in New York — have been identified for sale so far, but others are expected to follow. "Real estate ownership is not a core business for Bank of America," spokeswoman Kelli Raulerson said. "Therefore we are currently reviewing our administrative portfolio and may make the decision to sell our ownership interest in certain properties.

The largest Korean American bank in the country will soon be ensconced in a Wilshire Boulevard office complex built decades ago by of one of Southern California's most storied financial institutions. BBCN Bank, formed in a November merger between Nara Bank and Center Bank, will make its headquarters in Wilshire Colonnade. The marble-clad complex at 3731 Wilshire Blvd. - built in the early 1970s by H.F. Ahmanson & Co., parent company of Home Savings & Loan Assn. - was formerly known as Ahmanson Center.