Los Angeles home shortage is putting a strain on the local market. Brandywine Homes is trying to ease the pain.
In mid-December Brandywine Homes released 12 homes at its newest community in Los Angeles’ South Bay.
All 12 of the West Carson-located homes sold prior to January, enabling the homebuilder to release an additional three homes, which were also purchased quickly.
“That was a nice surprise,” said David Barisic, VP of sales and marketing for Brandywine, adding most of the buyers were young families from nearby Torrance. Additionally, all of the buyers were already on the homebuilder’s VIP list, meaning they had previously shown interest in the community and been pre-qualified with Brandywine’s lender.
The three- and four-bedroom homes, which are part of the 60-home community dubbed Brighton, sold for between $565,000 and $650,000.
Barisic attributes the early success of the community to a lack of competition and an overall shortage of homes and vacant land in the Torrance area. CalAtlantic Homes is one of the area’s only other builders.
Brandywine is traditional in its marketing. The company has mainly relied on newspaper ads and onsite signage.
“We’ve had an amazing response just off the signage,” Barisic noted.
The company recently held its official grand opening, which ended up being a phase-two release party. Prior to the opening, Barisic hoped that three or four homes would sell over the weekend.
Northeast LA construction is focus for Brandywine Homes
At 60 homes, Brighton represents a fairly large project for the homebuilder, who has historically focused on smaller communities in Orange County. In a few months, the company will start a 20-home community in Anaheim.
As part of its production ramp-up, Brandywine is also looking outside of the OC, primarily to northeast Los Angeles markets like Monrovia and Arcadia– where the company will begin building 17 townhomes.
Several years back the builder dabbled in multifamily construction, completing three deals in Orange County. Since that time two of the properties have been sold.
