MW Investment's Whittier Comstock Buys Brea Office Property Fairway Center II From Nuveen for $27.8M
The Whittier Comstock, LLC, a subsidiary of MW Investment, LLC and owned by Matt Waken, has acquired Fairway Center II, a 135,308-square-foot office property at 675 Placentia Ave. in Brea, Calif., for $27.8 million. Nuveen was the seller, and CBRE represented the seller and arranged financing for the buyer.
Fairway Center II Sale Details
The sale price equates to roughly $205 per square foot. The three-story, multi-tenant office building was 70.5% leased at the time of the sale and is anchored by the County of Orange, which occupies more than 61,000 square feet under a long-term lease. That tenancy represents about 45% of the building's total area, leaving roughly 39,900 square feet that is not leased.
The transaction did not include Fairway Center I, the adjacent office building owned by Dollinger Properties.
Nuveen bought the property in 2016 for $33.8 million, meaning the sale price is below its purchase price from a decade ago.
CBRE Role on Both Sides of the Deal
CBRE's Anthony DeLorenzo, with National Office Properties, along with Sammy Cemo, Bryan Johnson and Jackson Marlow, represented the seller. Shaun Moothart and Andrew Post of CBRE's Debt & Structured Finance practice secured the financing for the buyer. The financing carries an interest rate below 6%, which Moothart said "would not have been possible a year ago" as the capital markets environment for office properties has improved this year.
"Fairway Center II attracted significant interest amongst the investment and owner/user community alike," DeLorenzo said. "We received multiple competitive offers from a variety of buyer profiles and awarded the property to a private investor within the first 30 days of marketing."
Orange County Office Market Context
The sale comes as Orange County's office market shows signs of stabilization, although vacancy remains elevated. CBRE reported a 12.1% vacancy rate and a 16.5% availability rate in the third quarter of 2026, with average asking rents of $3.00 per square foot per month on a full-service-gross basis. Cushman & Wakefield measured overall vacancy at 14.2%, with rents rising to $2.93 per square foot per month, the market's highest level since the third quarter of 2021.
Newmark reported vacancy falling to 14.5% and positive net absorption for the fifth consecutive quarter, with 630,435 square feet of net gains in the quarter and 1.2 million square feet year to date through the third quarter. Kidder Mathews reported direct vacancy of 11.5% and average asking rents of $2.98 per square foot per month, with Class B rents averaging $2.74 per square foot per month.
Investment activity remains selective. Orange County office sales totaled 4.33 million square feet year to date, down 20.7% from the comparable 2025 period. Lee & Associates reported an average office sale price of $277 per square foot in the second quarter of 2026, above the roughly $206 per square foot implied by the Fairway Center II sale.
Other Orange County Office Trades Below Prior Prices
Fairway Center II is not the only Orange County office building to sell for less than its earlier price. Over the summer, Lincoln Property Company sold Orange Center Tower, a 14-story, 282,000-square-foot office building at 500 North State College Boulevard in Orange, for $63 million. Starwood sold the property to Lincoln in late 2017 for $92.5 million.
The priciest Orange County office sale of the second quarter was Shea Homes' purchase of a 65,340-square-foot building at 601 Dover Drive in Newport Beach, which IRA Capital sold for a land value of $26.5 million.
Outlook
The Fairway Center II sale illustrates how partially leased Orange County office assets continue to trade at discounts to broader market pricing, while buildings with durable tenants such as the County of Orange can draw multiple competing offers. The property's remaining vacancy gives the new owner room to lease up if tenant demand continues to improve.
Sources
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