State Bar property sale opens door for downtown apartments

A decision by the State Bar of California to move its longtime headquarters in downtown Los Angeles has cleared the way for a $250-million apartment and retail complex on what is now the State Bar’s parking lot near Staples Center.

Beverly Hills developer Sonny Astani and parking lot giant L&R; Group of Cos. bought the 3-acre property from the lawyers’ group for $29 million. It is surrounded by Olive Street, Grand Avenue, Pico Boulevard and 12th Street.

“This is probably the last large parking lot downtown that is unentitled and undeveloped,� Astani said.

His firm, Astani Enterprises Inc., plans to build 640 apartments in two seven-story buildings that would have shops and restaurants on the ground floors. He hopes to start work within a year.

The land sale helped fund the State Bar’s recent $50-million purchase of a building at 845 S. Figueroa St. where it will move after nearly 20 years in an AT&T; Center building on Hill Street. The seller was L&R;, which is renovating the 1960s-era building to make it into modern offices.

Astani has 2,500 apartments in $1 billion worth of mixed-use buildings in the pipeline for development in Hollywood, Koreatown, downtown and the Westside, he said.

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