Restaurateurs Look to Get Cooking in Venice Deal

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Many Angelenos see Lincoln Boulevard in Venice as a road to the airport – one lined with a hodgepodge of small businesses ranging from auto repair shops to liquor stores.

Chef Kris Yenbamroong saw it as a destination for the next outpost of his Thai restaurant Night + Market, and last year announced plans to take over the former Siam Best restaurant on Lincoln near Washington Boulevard. This month, he and his father, Prakas Yenbamroong, purchased a lot and small office next door for $2.2 million and plan to use it as a parking lot and office, which sit on 6,221 square feet.

Viewed as a land site, the deal value translated to $346 square foot.

The office is 1,611 square feet and leased until next year to a used-car dealership.

Laura Alice Scaturro, an associate at Marcus & Millichap who represented both the seller, Carolyn Kegarice, and the Yenbamroongs, said the lot will give Night + Market a much needed parking lot – and represents their long-term commitment to Lincoln, which is beginning to attract business spilling over from Abbott Kinney Boulevard and Rose Avenue. While monthly retail rents on Lincoln range from $3.50 to $7 a square foot, rates on Abbott Kinney can run $15 to $20, Scaturro said. In a sign of Abbott Kinney’s rise in prominence, shoemaker Adidas is set to take over the former Hal’s Bar & Grill space.

“There are no independents opening anymore on Abbott Kinney,” Scaturro said. “Where do those independents go? Lincoln is a great place for them.”

A Night + Market representative declined to comment and said the restaurant’s opening date has not yet been set. The restaurant company has two other locations in decidedly swankier areas – the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood and on Sunset Boulevard in Silver Lake.

Kegarice tried to sell the Lincoln property in 2014, but a deal never clicked as several development projects in the area seemed to stall.

Stadium Inspiration

Harridge Development Group is swooping into Inglewood with a plan to build 228 townhomes on an 18-acre site just a mile from the Los Angeles Rams’ planned $2.6 billion stadium. The Miracle Mile-based company purchased the property last week from Irvine’s Shopoff Realty Investments of Irvine, which bought the site – the former Daniel Freeman Hospital – in 2013 and entitled it for 310 homes.

David Schwartzman, Harridge’s chief executive, said he plans to begin demolition in the next few weeks and complete the project by the time the stadium opens in mid-2019. Plans call for homes priced from the mid-$800,000s to low $900,000s, and Schwartzman said the stadium’s retail and office space would help attract buyers.

“It could be the next Playa Vista, with everything going on there. We like to be in front of the trend,” he said.

Bill Shopoff, chief executive at Shopoff Realty, said the project was likely to be successful even without the stadium, given the demand for new housing at affordable prices. Even so, his hopes for a bigger return were dashed by tight financing in the homebuilding industry.

“It takes way more equity today,” he said. “We have good demand, and prices are back at or near peak values, but the capital is not as available.”

Neither he nor Schwartzman would disclose the deal’s value. The Hoffman Co.’s Bryant Brislin brokered the deal for the land, which Shopoff had been leasing to movie and TV productions.

Father’s Office Moves

Father’s Office, helmed by chef Sang Yoon, is moving further east.

The famed burger eatery with locations in Santa Monica and Culver City has signed a lease for a 5,100-square-foot restaurant space in the Garey Building, an apartment complex in downtown’s Arts District co-owned by Lowe Enterprises, Megatoys, and institutional investors advised by J.P. Morgan Asset Management.

The 320-unit apartment complex opened in July and is 78 percent occupied. Cushman & Wakefield brokers Matthew Fainchtein and Carter Magnin represented the landlord on the lease deal.

Staff reporter Daina Beth Solomon can be reached at [email protected] or (323) 556-8337.