Mingtiandi

Asia real estate and outbound investment news

  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • RSS
  • Twitter
Remember Me

Lost your password?

Register Now

Loading...
  • Capital Markets
  • Events
    • Mingtiandi 2025 Event Calendar
    • Mingtiandi APAC Residential Forum 2025
    • Mingtiandi Singapore Forum 2025
    • Mingtiandi APAC Logistics Forum 2025
    • Mingtiandi APAC Data Centre Forum 2025
    • Mingtiandi Tokyo Forum 2025
    • More Events
  • MTD TV
    • Residential
    • Logistics
    • Data Centre
    • Office
    • Singapore
    • Tokyo
    • Hong Kong
    • All Videos
    • Post-Event Stories
  • People
    • Industry Moves
    • MTD TV Speakers
  • Logistics
  • Data Centres
  • Asia Outbound
  • Retail
  • Research & Policy
  • Advertise

Shanghai’s Greenland Group Knocks 27% Off Price of LA Tower in $504M Sale

2022/11/09 by Christopher Caillavet Leave a Comment

Greenland Metropolis

Plans for Greenland’s Metropolis project looked simple enough back in 2014 (Getty Images)

Struggling to repay bond investors, Greenland Holdings has sold a 59-storey Los Angeles residential tower, the centrepiece of the Chinese developer’s first-ever US project, to American apartment operator Northland for $504 million.

The transaction for the 685-unit THEA at Metropolis in downtown LA marks one of the biggest single-asset multifamily acquisitions in US history, Northland said Tuesday in a release, with the price representing a more than 27 percent discount to the $695 million that Greenland was asking for the tower as recently as 18 months ago, according to an account in the Wall Street Journal.

“In THEA, Northland secured an extraordinary opportunity to acquire the highest quality luxury apartment tower in the United States at a steeply discounted price,” Northland CEO Matthew Gottesdiener said without making reference to Greenland as the seller. “The building’s spectacular design, condo execution and unparalleled amenities offer residents a next-level experience that will hold the test of time.”

THEA forms part of the 6.3 acre (2.5 hectare) Metropolis mixed-use development, consisting of the rental tower, two condo buildings and a hotel. The $1 billion project has become an albatross for Greenland as the Shanghai government-backed builder reckons with more than $2 billion in offshore debt coming due by mid-2023.

Deep Discount to Replacement

The $504 million price for the property values the multifamily units at $714,000 each and $688 per square foot, a 40-45 percent discount to replacement costs, according to Northland. The asset also includes 30,000 square feet (2,787 square metres) of ground floor retail.

Greenland Group boss Zhang Yuliang

Greenland Group boss Zhang Yuliang won’t win any more prizes for his record of cross-border deals (Getty Images)

Massachusetts-based Northland, which operates as a real estate private equity firm, acquired THEA without any partners, investing through discretionary funds and financing the purchase with 10-year fixed-rate debt

Greenland’s 2013 purchase of the Metropolis project from the California State Teachers’ Retirement System was one of the early milestones in an outbound real estate investment wave that put the developer onto a global stage. But by 2018 the group was already marketing the then-condo tower, the tallest and final building in the development, for a reported asking price of $450 million amid disappointing sales and China’s crackdown on capital outflows. The Shanghai-based firm has not issued a statement on the disposal and had not responded to inquiries from Mingtiandi by the time of publication.

780x250 CorporateV2

Greenland continues to own the Hotel Indigo at the Metropolis, an 18-storey, 350-room property operated by InterContinental Hotels Group. The developer put the hotel on the market this year for a second time, according to local media accounts, after reportedly shopping the building for $280 million back in 2018.

Trail of Tears

Earlier this month, S&P Global Ratings downgraded Greenland to CC from CCC- and its senior bonds to C from CC. The agency regards a plan by the developer to extend the maturity of nine of its offshore bonds as “tantamount to a default”.

In March, Reuters reported that Greenland had scrambled for funds late last year to pay a $500 million offshore bond that came due in December. The company was rescued after Shanghai authorities told local state-owned enterprises to step in and buy new Greenland debt, Reuters said, citing sources who spoke to the news agency.

The near default didn’t prevent Greenland from reappointing founder and chairman Zhang Yuliang, 66, to a fresh four-year term in February. The Shanghai native became a rare example of an executive in China’s state sector to extend his tenure deep into his sixties.

Zhang has spent 2022 selling off Greenland’s portfolio of foreign assets, including with the February disposal of the final two phases of the Ram Quarter project in London that the group had purchased for £135.7 million ($184 million) in 2014.  The last pieces of the Metropolis project and some elements of the Pacific Park complex in Brooklyn are all that remain from a series of Greenland US acquisitions from 2013 to 2017, with the company having sold off a Bay Area site in June 2018 without breaking ground, before selling off three plots in Pacific Park in October that year.

In June, Greenland sold its strata-titled Lachlan’s Square Village mall in the Sydney suburb of Macquarie Park to Australia’s Revelop for A$30 million ($21.6 million), with the property forming part of Greenland’s A$800 million NBH at Lachlan’s Line mixed-use development.

Share this now

  • LinkedIn
  • Share
  • Tweet
  • Email

Filed Under: Outbound Investment Tagged With: daily-sp, Greenland Group, Los Angeles, Metropolis Los Angeles, US

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Get Mingtiandi Delivered

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

MTD TV

Life Sciences Spotlight
Warburg-Backed Vita Partners Spotlights Life Sciences at Singapore Show: MTD TV
Fergal Harris, JLL
Ivanhoe, Phoenix, SDAX and JLL Talk the Ties That Bind Singapore and Australia

More MTD TV Videos>>

People in the News

EQT_David Kim
Asia Real Estate People in the News 2025-06-21
singh-anshuman
Asia Real Estate People in the News 2025-06-16
Raymond Lee Paul Hastings
Law Partner Picks Up Hong Kong Home of Former Birmingham City Boss for $37M
Teo Chee Hean Temasek
Asia Real Estate People in the News 2025-06-09

More Industry Professionals>>

Latest Stories

Chan Hung Ming Grand Ming
Bain Capital in Exclusive Talks to Acquire Hong Kong Data Centre Projects for Up to $274M
Stuart Dawes Gateway
Aussie Shed Surge Continues with $87M Gateway Portfolio Disposal
EQT_David Kim
Asia Real Estate People in the News 2025-06-21

Sponsored Features

How to Create a Win-Win for Investors and Occupiers
Lingeage Logistics Cold Storage Complex
Mount Maunganui Cold Storage Facility for Sale
7 in 10 Senior Directors Confident in Data Centres, but Talent Shortage Will Widen

More Sponsored Features>>

Connect with Mingtiandi

  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • RSS
  • Twitter

Real Estate News

  • Capital Markets
  • Mingtiandi 2025 Event Calendar
  • MTD TV Archives
  • People
  • Logistics
  • Data Centres
  • Asia Outbound
  • Retail

More Mingtiandi

  • About Mingtiandi
  • Contact Mingtiandi
  • Mingtiandi Memberships
  • Newsletter Subscription
  • Advertise
  • Terms of Use
  • Privacy
  • Join the Mingtiandi Team


© 2007-2025 China Advertising Media Ltd (Samoa). All rights reserved.

We use cookies in accordance with our Privacy policy to provide the best user experience on Mingtiandi and to safeguard user data. By continuing to browse you consent to the policy. AcceptRefuse