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Thursday, Mar 28, 2024

Restaurant Vacancies Fill up at Sherman Oaks Galleria

After months with little on its plate, the Sherman Oaks Galleria is starting to fill up with new restaurant clients. The center has inked deals with El Torito Grill and Romano’s Macaroni Grill, leases that will shore up what had been a 26 percent retail vacancy rate at the entertainment and office complex at Sepulveda and Ventura boulevards. El Torito Grill will occupy the 8,000-square-foot forward space opposite The Cheesecake Factory that had for a brief time housed Bobby Loco’s. Macaroni Grill opened at the center today. The opening of El Torito Grill, slated for November, marks the first location for the restaurant format in the San Fernando Valley. El Torito Grill, owned by El Torito Restaurants Inc., operates six units elsewhere in Southern California and in several other states. The concept is more upscale compared to the El Torito chain, with a menu that features native and contemporary Mexican dishes, grilled specialties and a large selection of top-shelf tequilas. Where most of the El Torito entr & #233;e selections are in the $10 range, the Grill menu features items as high as $16.99. Macaroni Grill, a division of Brinker International Inc. that launched in 1988, now operates units in Burbank, Northridge, Simi Valley, Thousand Oaks and Santa Clarita along with the new Sherman Oaks store. The restaurant features lighter Italian dishes such as fire-grilled chicken and shrimp and selections of low-carb and low fat dishes. The space El Torito will occupy has been leased twice before since the Galleria’s renovation into an entertainment center was completed in 2001. Prego, a part of the Spectrum Restaurant Group, closed in 2003 when its parent company filed Chap. 11. The next tenant, Bobby Loco’s, an independent operator, shuttered late in 2004 after about six months of business. Observers have noted that Prego’s high price points limited the restaurant’s opportunities in the area, however, neighboring P.F. Chang’s , with similar pricing, has consistently done well at the Galleria location. Simi Center Books New Tenants Simi Valley Town Center, which got the news a few weeks ago that its anchor tenant, Federated Department Stores Inc., will scuttle plans to operate two department stores on the property as a result of the acquisition of May Department Stores Co., owners of Robinsons-May, has inked deals with seven new retailers, bringing the center’s tenant census to 92. Simi Valley Town Center, slated to open in late October, has inked deals with Coach, Z Gallerie, Ben Bridge Jeweler, Corner Bakery, Sweet Factory, The Pet Shop and Urban Home. The center was to have been anchored by Robinsons-May and Macy’s. But with the acquisition, Federated has announced plans to rename all the stores under the Macy’s moniker and shutter duplicate stores, including the Simi Valley location. Federated said it would, however, open the 107,000-square-foot store as scheduled and operate it until a buyer is found. In the Valley, in addition to previously announced closings at Northridge Fashion Center, Glendale Galleria and The Oaks, Federated recently announced that it would close the Macy’s men’s store in The Promenade in Woodland Hills, merging that unit with the second Macy’s that also operates at the location. All told Federated plans to divest 75 stores across the country. Complex Sells Above List A 170-unit apartment complex in Canoga Park has sold for $21.2 million. The complex, at 8561 De Soto Ave., sits on 3.62 acres of land. The buyer was Aviation Plaza Partners L.P. Dean Zander, a broker with Hendricks & Partners, who negotiated the transaction, said the deal exceeded the listed price for the property. User Buys Chatsworth Building FB Productions, a commercial printing and packaging company, has acquired a Chatsworth building it has tenanted for the past seven years. The company paid $6.5 million for the 50,236-square-foot building, located on about three acres of land at 9540 Topanga Canyon Blvd. Ross Thomas at Delphi Business Properties and John Griffin and Max Wang of Voit Commercial, represented the seller, Sun Life Assurance Co. of Canada. The buyers were represented by Dave Heavner. Valley Village Deal A 30-unit apartment building in Valley Village was sold for $4,550,000. The 26,370-square foot property is located at 12633 Burbank Blvd. Warren Berzack, a broker with Investment Real Estate Associates, represented the buyer, Jeffrey Wilson, and the seller Gura Family Trust in the deal. Multifamily Sales Hanes Investment Realty in Westlake Village has closed more than $6.25 million of transactions in the San Fernando Valley. Hanes’s Todd S. Schwartz represented the sellers in an 8-unit North Hollywood apartment complex that sold for $1.1 million. Schwartz, along with Bryan B. Hanes and Braemon M. Hanes, represented the sellers in a $2,750,000 transaction for a 14-unit complex, also in North Hollywood. And Bryan and Braemon Hanes also represented the sellers in a $2.5 million deal for a 13-unit complex in Glendale.

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