New Mall in West Hollywood Is Sold

West Hollywood Gateway, a new shopping center on the east edge of West Hollywood, was sold by Los Angeles developer J.H. Snyder Co. for $72 million to real estate investment advisory firm ING Clarion Partners, Snyder said Tuesday.

Snyder completed the 250,000-square-foot mall this year at Santa Monica Boulevard and La Brea Avenue. Anchored by Target and Best Buy, the two-story center is 98% leased.

Company founder Jerome Snyder, whose firm owns and operates many other properties it has developed, said “the market was just so strong it made sense to sell.”

The mall is east of the Lot, a filming facility once owned by actors Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks that was last known as Warner Hollywood Studios.

West Hollywood officials required Snyder to preserve the adjacent historic Formosa Cafe during construction. The Formosa opened as a lunch counter in 1925 and has served generations of movie stars and studio personnel.

Designed by Jerde Partnership, a Los Angeles architectural firm, the Gateway includes a landscaped open-air courtyard with a fountain, extra-wide sidewalks along Santa Monica Boulevard and an electronic billboard.

Snyder said he hoped to develop a second phase that would consist of apartments or condominiums on land to the west owned by Southern California Gas Co.

New York-based ING Clarion bought the mall on behalf of one of its co-mingled funds, said real estate broker Lawrence H. Krasner of CB Richard Ellis, who represented the seller with his partner David Doupe.