Red Lobster land sold on restaurant row
El Torito eatery land and building also listed for sale off of The Old Road near Magic Mountain Parkway
The land and building of Red Lobster on restaurant row in Valencia have been sold for the full asking price of $3,576,642, said the broker who represented longtime land owner Marquis Valley View LLC.
The transaction closed Tuesday.
“There were multiple offers on the property up to 20 of them,” said Yair Haimoff, executive vice president with NAI Capital.
Red Lobster, which has five years left on its lease, is planning to continue operating in place by leasing the space from the new owner, investor Samuel Simonian, Haimoff said.
Operating at the site since 1986, Red Lobster has been a fixture on restaurant row — opening before Santa Clarita even became a city. At one point diners, having few options in the region, flocked to restaurant row for dining experiences.
The restaurant occupies 9,487 square feet of space on a lot sized at 50,094 square feet.
Annual rent paid by the restaurant is reportedly $245,000.
Owned by the Darden Restaurant chain since 1995, Red Lobster became an independent restaurant company in 2014. It was acquired by Golden Gate Capital.
The buyer of the current site, represented by Andrew Optima of Remax Optima in Glendale, was very diligent in pursuing his offer, Haimoff said.
“Every time we asked for a certain document or proof of funds he provided it in a series of counter offers,” he said. “This buyer really stepped up.”
As for the market, Haimoff said investments are still appealing to investors whenever they find one that makes sense.
The number of offers NAI Capital received reflected that. The site is close to the future Newhall Ranch development, in an area with good demographics, and sits right off the Interstate 5 freeway making it ideal.
In November the land under the site of the former Beef ‘O’ Brady’s restaurant was sold to a medical practice. While the price on that deal was not disclosed, it also generated multiple offers on the listing price of $3.35 million.
Currently, the the El Torito restaurant site is also for sale, listed at $4.1 million. Both the building and land on this deal is larger than the Red Lobster sale.
“The Red Lobster was all about location, location, location,” Haimoff said.