Three Big Projects, Three Vastly Different Futures

LOS ANGELES-Three key commercial real estate projects in the LA area are ending the week in decidedly different fashion, with one being thrown back on the market, a second close to being permanently removed from future development and the third apparently close to finding a replacement for a big dot-com tenant that recently went bust.

The dot-com project is Santa Monica-based eToys Inc.’s sprawling, 762,000-sf warehouse and distribution facility in the Inland Empire community of Ontario. The online toy retailer was a Wall Street darling a year ago, but filed for bankruptcy earlier this year and announced plans to go out of business.

Brokers in the area say that fast-growing shoe manufacturer Skechers USA Inc. has agreed to take over the building, though neither eToys nor Skechers will confirm it. Two weeks ago, a Delaware judge overseeing the toy retailer’s bankruptcy approved the sale of the equipment and furniture at the plant to Skechers for $835,000, but the sale did not involve the building itself.