The month of December showed us that we shouldn’t waver to the ailing landscape. Although the pandemic seemed to eclipse its own record highs at a daily pace, our team was hard at work with client ambition as the main objective to meet.
Three of our very own agents in Gus Sverkos, Ryan Rayburn, and Mike Alper were able to leverage a generational asset, under heavy management, by representing both ends of a 1031-Exchange in the city of Bellflower. The property in question was the Eucalyptus Center on Alondra Blvd. and Eucalyptus Ave. This was a 55-thousand square foot property which included a 10-Unit retail center, a 3B/1BA house, and six 1B/1BA bungalows.
Mike Alper represented the seller who was looking to exchange their equity into income properties closer to home that would be easier to manage.
The owners of the Eucalyptus Center faced several challenges, among them, the rents were low, they had deferred maintenance, were absentee owners, and multiple tenants were closed due to the pandemic. The ultimate goal was to procure as many offers as possible in order to show the owners that with some simple “sweat equity,” Eucalyptus Center could entice buyers.
We decided to sit down and strategize on the ideal buyer. It was obvious that the buyer needed to be someone who was invested in the city of Bellflower as well as someone local in order to avoid the tribulations that an absentee owner endures.
The result? An all-cash 14-day closing. Gus Sverkos—who represented the buy side of this deal—generated five offers in one week in order to show the client this pandemic wasn’t hindering Centennial Advisers’ efforts. Ultimately, the owners of the Eucalyptus Center were able to transition from a management intensive environment to one that was more passive.
