Apple Buys 384K SF Office Campus Near HQ in Cupertino

Apple has purchased a 10-building office campus in proximity to its headquarters in Cupertino, CA—a complex it has leased for more than a decade.

The complex, known as Apple Results Way Campus, is a 384K SF office and research campus located in an area of Cupertino known as Five Results Way. Apple has leased the 20-acre property since 2011.

According to a report in the San Jose Mercury News, the buyer and the seller were both Apple and the purchase price was not disclosed. Okay, we’ll wait a couple of minutes while you upgrade your operating system and digest this news.

In what sounds like a commercial real estate version of a three-card monte game, an unnamed corporate entity of Apple was named the designated successor of a new affiliate of Swift Real Estate Partners that was created by Swift for one purpose: to own the properties that Apple just bought.

The Swift Realty Partners affiliate purchased the 10-building campus in 2020 for $346M.

Apparently, this kind of okie-doke with title documents is a legal way to avoid paying a transfer tax imposed by Santa Clara County when a property is purchased in transactions when the buyer and seller are two distinct entities.

[They have a much easier way of doing this kind of thing at New Jersey liquor stores: they leave the cash drawer open when they ring up your bourbon and don’t offer a receipt unless you ask for one and—voila!—they pocket the state sales tax and Gov. Murphy never finds out.]

In July, Apple unveiled plans to build a new 536K SF regional headquarters in Los Angeles.

According to a report in Urbanize Los Angeles, the tech giant plans to have its architect sheath the exterior of the building, located on the border of Culver City and Los Angeles, in designer copper.

The regional HQ campus, to be known as Culver Crossings, will include two buildings—one four stories and the other five stories—on a 4.5-acre site that straddles National, Washington and Venice boulevards.

The new development, which will replace a block of office and industrial buildings Apple purchased for $162M in late 2020, will double Apple’s footprint in Culver City, where the company’s streaming service is based (Culver City is becoming a hub for streaming services, including an Amazon production facility).

The project, expected to host up to 2,400 employees, will include production studios for small-format multimedia content, plus a cafeteria and coffee stations.

The two-building U-shaped office campus, designed by Gensler, will feature floor-to-ceiling glass divided by wrap-around balconies and topped by broad eaves. A three-level underground garage will include more than 1,200 parking spaces.