Santa Monica, California
Who owns Santa Monica: the City holds its airport, pier and civic centre, the open county roll values every parcel but names no private owner, and listed REITs report the office campuses.
10 buildings · 9 with an owner established · 11 sources · 9 tier A · 1 tier B · prepared 2026-11-01
California has no public online land-title register. Santa Monica sits in Los Angeles County, whose Assessor publishes an open parcel layer with land and improvement values, floor areas and use codes but no owner-name field. Deeds are recorded with the county Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk and are open to anyone in person, but that office 'does not provide online access to our real estate records or indexes', citing Government Code section 6254.21; a certified copy costs $6 for the first page and $3 for each page after. The roll carries a Prop 13 base year, never a sale price.
The marquee buildings
The towers that set the tone of the core, and who holds them. A price is the price a document states, on the date it states — not an estimate of what the building is worth now.
| Building | Use | Owner | Owner type | Last price paid |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Santa Monica Airport (SMO) 3223 Donald Douglas Loop S, Santa Monica, CA 90405 |
Civic | City of Santa Monica The Assessor's publicly owned parcel layer lists AIN 4272026902 (3223 Donald Douglas Loop S, about 96 acres) and AIN 4272031908 (2800 Donald Douglas Loop N, about 28 acres), both use code 8862 and owner 'SANTA MONICA CITY'; the three 8862 parcels total about 146 acres and the City holds about 195 acres in assessor map book 4272. Acres are our polygon calculation. The City says it will close the airport 'at midnight on December 31, 2028, as required under a 2017 Federal Consent Decree with the Federal Aviation Administration' (press release, 26 Sept 2025, s5). |
Government | —A |
| Santa Monica Pier 200 Santa Monica Pier, Santa Monica, CA 90401 |
Civic | City of Santa Monica shared with the State of California by parcel The pier is split on the roll. 'SANTA MONICA CITY' holds two parcels at 200 Santa Monica Pier (AINs 4290023902 and 4290023903, about 5.1 acres together); 'STATE OF CALIF' holds AIN 4290023901 at 380 Santa Monica Pier (about 5.1 acres, use code 8854) and the 9.5-acre beach parcel at 301 Santa Monica Pier (AIN 4291030904). Publicly owned parcel layer, November 2025 edit; acres are our polygon calculation. |
Government | —A |
| Santa Monica Civic Auditorium and civic centre 1855 Main St, Santa Monica, CA 90401 |
Civic | City of Santa Monica AIN 4290013901, 1855 Main St, about 7.0 acres, use code 6500, owner 'SANTA MONICA CITY'. Next door the State holds AIN 4290012903 at 1725 Main St (about 3.1 acres, 'STATE OF CALIFORNIA'), and the City an unaddressed 6.8-acre parcel (AIN 4290012902). City Hall's own address, 1685 Main St, does not appear on the layer, so which civic-centre parcel it sits on is not stated. |
Government | —A |
| Santa Monica Place 395 Santa Monica Place, Santa Monica, CA 90401 357,000 sq ft GLA (Macerich); 475,736 sq ft main building area on the roll |
Retail | The Macerich Company 100% (owner of record; property under a court-appointed receiver) Macerich's FY2025 10-K lists Santa Monica Place at 100%, 357,000 sq ft, 71.2% leased. It says Macerich 'defaulted on the $300.0 million loan on Santa Monica Place' on 9 April 2024; 'On March 18, 2025, a court appointed receiver assumed operational control', and Macerich 'is still the owner of record' and expects disposition 'through foreclosure, deed-in-lieu of foreclosure, or by some other means'. The roll (s3, 2026) puts AIN 4291026026 at $279.4M ($28.0M land + $251.3M improvements), land base year 2007. Macerich's head office is in Santa Monica, at 401 Wilshire Blvd. |
REIT | —A |
| Colorado Center Colorado Ave, Santa Monica, CA 90404 1,130,066 sq ft net rentable, 6 buildings |
Office | BXP, Inc. (via Colorado Center, LLC) 50% interest BXP's FY2025 10-K property table: 'Colorado Center (50% ownership) Santa Monica, CA 89.6 % 6 1,130,066'. The unconsolidated joint venture is 'Colorado Center, LLC', 50.00%, with a $550.0M mortgage maturing 9 August 2027 (BXP's share $274.9M). The 10-K does not name the other 50% holder in the passages we read, and we did not tie the campus to particular roll parcels. |
REIT | —A |
| Santa Monica Business Park around 2800 28th St, Santa Monica, CA 90405 1,104,377 sq ft office (14 buildings) + 73,006 sq ft retail (7 buildings) |
Office | BXP, Inc. 100% (wholly owned) BXP's FY2025 10-K lists Santa Monica Business Park, 14 office buildings, 1,104,377 sq ft, 83.4% occupied, plus SMBP retail, and counts it as wholly owned; 'During the year ended December 31, 2023, the Company acquired its joint venture partner's 45 % ownership interest in Santa Monica Business Park'. It carries a $200.0M mortgage at 5.28% maturing 8 October 2028. BXP's regional office is at 2800 28th Street, Santa Monica. No purchase price is quoted here. |
REIT | —A |
| 100 Wilshire 100 Wilshire Blvd, Santa Monica, CA 90401 285,379 sq ft (roll) |
Office | Douglas Emmett Douglas Emmett's FY2025 Schedule III lists '100 Wilshire', built 1968/2002/2019, acquired 1999, gross carrying amount $252.8M. The roll (s3, 2026) has AIN 4291001035 at 100 Wilshire Blvd, office, 285,379 sq ft, built 1971, $138.5M ($50.5M land + $87.9M improvements) with a 1999 land base year, matching the acquisition year. Douglas Emmett's Schedule III also lists 233 Wilshire (acquired 2016), 401 Wilshire (1996) and 429 Santa Monica in the city. |
REIT | —A |
| 1299 Ocean Avenue 1299 Ocean Ave, Santa Monica, CA 90401 102,157 sq ft per roll parcel (two parcels) |
Office | Douglas Emmett Douglas Emmett's 10-K: 'Our principal executive offices are located in the building we own at 1299 Ocean Avenue, Suite 1000, Santa Monica'. Schedule III: '1299 Ocean', built 1980/2006/2020, acquired 2017, gross $315.6M. The roll (s3, 2026) has two parcels at 1299 Ocean Ave (AINs 4291001034 and 4291001029), $199.1M and $138.3M, both with a 2017 land base year. |
REIT | —A |
| UCLA Health hospital block, 15th–16th Streets 1233 15th St, Santa Monica, CA 90404 492,282 sq ft (roll) |
Institutional | The Regents of the University of California The publicly owned parcel layer lists AIN 4282002901, 1233 15th St, about 3.2 acres, use code 7406, owner 'REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CA', with five smaller Regents parcels on the same block (1214 16th St, 1213 15th St, 1502/1512/1524 Wilshire). The main layer (s3) describes AIN 4282002901 as 'Hospitals', 492,282 sq ft, built 1986, no roll value. That this is UCLA's Santa Monica medical centre is our identification from the location; the roll names only the Regents. The Regents hold 23 parcels in the city in all. |
Government | —B |
| Beachfront hotel at 1700 Ocean Avenue 1700 Ocean Ave, Santa Monica, CA 90401 301,579 sq ft (roll) |
Hotel | Not established a paid title search would answer it The roll (2026) has AIN 4290019011 at 1700 Ocean Ave, 'Hotel & Motels', 301,579 sq ft, built 1988, $337.7M ($72.7M land + $265.1M improvements), land base year 2017, the third most valuable parcel in the city. The roll names no owner and gives no price; the deed is available only as a $6 certified copy from the Registrar-Recorder. Loews Corporation's FY2025 10-K does not mention Santa Monica, so it is not stated there as a Loews-owned hotel. |
Not established | —A |
The core land
The most valuable ground in the city, and what the public record says about it.
The county's open parcel service values every parcel in Santa Monica and names no private owner. Figures computed on 1 November 2026 from the 2026 roll for the 23,558 parcels with TaxRateCity = SANTA MONICA (s3).
Who owns the town
At this scale the significant owner is rarely a trust or a fund: it is one or two local holding companies, a family in its second or third generation, and often the land around the town rather than the buildings in it.
Santa Monica names no private owner on any open dataset, but the Assessor's layer of publicly owned parcels names 511 public and exempt holders' parcels in the city, about 900 acres. The City is by far the largest, chiefly the airport, beach lots, parks and the civic centre; the State holds most of the beach; the school district and Santa Monica College follow. Railroads and investor-owned utilities are absent because the State Board of Equalization assesses their operating property. Acres are our calculation from the layer's polygon areas (Web Mercator corrected for latitude); spellings are grouped; counts are as of the layer's November 2025 edit.
| Name | Type | Publicly owned parcels, Santa Monica |
|---|---|---|
| City of Santa Monica 'SANTA MONICA CITY' (342 parcels, ~561 acres), plus 'SANTA MONICA CITY CEMETERY' (3 parcels, ~19.6 acres; the largest is AIN 4283033918, 18.5 acres), 'SANTA MONICA CITY PARKING (AUTHORITY)' (12 parcels, ~3.2 acres) and one 'S BY S' parcel. The largest holdings are the airport parcels in map book 4272 (~195 acres) and the Civic Auditorium at 1855 Main St (7.0 acres). |
Government | 358 parcels, about 584 acresA |
| State of California 'STATE OF CALIF' and 'STATE OF CALIFORNIA' — mostly beach parcels along Ocean Front Walk and Palisades Beach Road (e.g. 2400 and 2525 Ocean Front Walk, 415 Palisades Beach Rd), the 9.5-acre parcel at 301 Santa Monica Pier, part of the pier at 380 Santa Monica Pier, and 1725 Main St in the civic centre. |
Government | 52 parcels, about 118 acresA |
| Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District Listed as 'SANTA MONICA UNIFIED SCHOOL DIST' (24 parcels, ~110 acres) and 'SANTA MONICA MALIBU UNIFIED' (5, ~6.8 acres). The largest is AIN 4273024900 at 2425 16th St, about 16.4 acres. |
Government | 29 parcels, about 116 acresA |
| Santa Monica Community College District The main campus parcel is AIN 4273001908 at 1702 Pico Blvd, about 37.7 acres ('SANTA MONICA COMMUNITY COLLEGE DIST'). |
Government | 20 parcels, about 47 acresA |
| Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority Under 'LACMTA' and several spellings of 'L A County Metropolitan Transportation Authority' — the Expo Line right-of-way, its Bergamot-area parcels in map book 4268, and Colorado Ave sites such as 1610 and 430 Colorado Ave. |
Government | 20 parcels, about 22 acresA |
| The Regents of the University of California Clustered on the hospital block between 15th and 16th Streets north of Santa Monica Blvd, the largest being AIN 4282002901 at 1233 15th St (3.2 acres, hospital use). |
Government | 23 parcels, about 9 acresA |
| United States Postal Service 1623 and 1653 7th St and an adjoining unaddressed parcel. No other federal holder appears in the city. |
Government | 3 parcels, about 1.8 acresA |
| County of Los Angeles / LA County Development Authority 'L A COUNTY' at 2509 Pico Blvd (1.5 acres) and 'LA COUNTY DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY' (the county housing authority) at 1901–1907 11th St (3 parcels, ~0.5 acres). |
Government | 4 parcels, about 2 acresA |
Who builds the houses
New-home building in this market: the volume, and the firms behind it. Ownership of a builder matters as much as its volume — a private-equity platform and a family firm behave differently.
Santa Monica permitted 460 new dwellings in 2025 according to the Census Building Permits Survey: 90 in single-unit buildings, 8 in two-unit buildings, 18 in 3–4-unit buildings and 344 in 20 buildings of five or more units. Most new housing is therefore apartments, built by private multifamily developers that publish no builder-level count; the city is built out and none of the national homebuilders reports a Santa Monica figure. So no builder league table can be assembled from open sources. The largest listed residential landlord in the city is Douglas Emmett (940 apartments in 3 properties, see commercial).
| Name | Type | Units permitted 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| All builders (Census Building Permits Survey) we2025a.txt, Santa Monica row (place code 70000): 1-unit 90 buildings/90 units ($22.8M); 2-unit 4/8; 3–4-unit 6/18; 5+ units 20 buildings/344 units ($25.1M valuation). Not a builder; listed so the market's size is on record. |
Not established | 460 units in 120 buildingsA |
Commercial landlords
The commercial side, counted separately from housing: who holds the office, retail and industrial floor area.
Santa Monica's large office campuses are held by listed REITs, so their floor areas are published even though the roll names nobody. Three of them have their head offices in the city: Douglas Emmett (1299 Ocean Ave), Macerich (401 Wilshire Blvd) and BXP's western regional office (2800 28th St). Figures below are Santa Monica holdings only, from each company's FY2025 10-K. Whether larger private owners hold more in the city is not stated in any open source we read.
| Name | Type | Santa Monica holdings, 31 Dec 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| BXP, Inc. Colorado Center: 6 buildings, 1,130,066 sq ft, 50% via Colorado Center, LLC. Santa Monica Business Park: 14 office buildings, 1,104,377 sq ft, plus 7 retail buildings, 73,006 sq ft, wholly owned since BXP bought its partner's 45% interest in 2023. |
REIT | 2.31M sq ft (Colorado Center at 50% + Santa Monica Business Park)A |
| Douglas Emmett Schedule III lists 100 Wilshire, 233 Wilshire, 401 Wilshire, 429 Santa Monica and 1299 Ocean; the multifamily table lists Santa Monica as 3 properties, 940 units, 99.7% leased, $4,656 a month per leased unit, and notes 'a large number of units that, due to Santa Monica rent control laws, have had only modest rent increases since 1979'. Schedule III also has an 'Ocean Avenue' apartment property acquired 2022. |
REIT | 5 office properties + 3 apartment properties (940 units)A |
| The Macerich Company Owner of record of Santa Monica Place, 100%, but in default on its $300.0M loan since April 2024 and under a court-appointed receiver since 18 March 2025, with disposition expected. |
REIT | 357,000 sq ft (Santa Monica Place)A |
| Kilroy Realty Stabilized portfolio table: 2100/2110 Colorado Avenue, 3 buildings, 104,853 sq ft, 55.4% occupied. Kilroy sold 501 Santa Monica Boulevard (1 building, 78,509 sq ft) in June 2025 for a gross $40.0 million. |
REIT | 104,853 sq ft (2100/2110 Colorado Ave, 3 buildings)A |
Looked for and not found
Claims this page would have made if a source could be opened. They are left out rather than guessed.
- Who owns the 1700 Ocean Ave beachfront hotel parcel ($337.7M on the 2026 roll, land base 2017) and the other Ocean Avenue hotels at 1910 Ocean Way, 1 Pico Blvd, 101 Wilshire and 1740 Ocean Ave. The roll names no owners and no filing we opened does.
- Who owns 2700 Colorado Ave, the most valuable parcel in the city ($435.2M, land base 2017), and 2500 Broadway / 2501 Colorado Ave (land base 2005). No filing we opened ties these parcels to an owner; we did not match them to BXP's Colorado Center.
- The airport's full extent: the City is widely reported to describe Santa Monica Airport as 227 acres wholly owned by the City, about 17 of them in the City of Los Angeles. The City's own airport pages did not render for us, so that figure is not cited; the roll layer shows about 146 acres of airport-use parcels inside Santa Monica.
- Providence Saint John's Health Center (2121 Santa Monica Blvd): it does not appear by that address on either county layer, so its parcel and holder are not recorded.
- Which civic-centre parcel holds City Hall (1685 Main St); the publicly owned layer gives that parcel no address.
- Who holds the other 50% of Colorado Center, LLC; BXP's 10-K passages we read do not name the partner.
- Whether the LA County Assessor's per-parcel portal shows an assessee name; it renders as a JavaScript shell (Los Angeles record) and was not retried.
Sources
- Real Estate Records — General Info: 'Our office does not provide online access to real estate records or indexes' — Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk · openA
- View Real Estate Records — 'The fee for a certified copy of a document is $6 for the first page and $3 for each additional page per document' — Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk · openA
- LA County Parcel Map Service, layer 0 (Parcels) — 23,558 parcels with TaxRateCity = SANTA MONICA; values, floor areas, use codes, no owner name — Los Angeles County Office of the Assessor / LA County Enterprise GIS · openA
- Assessor Publicly Owned Parcels (Current) — 511 parcels in Santa Monica with OwnerName — Los Angeles County Office of the Assessor (ArcGIS Online feature service) · openA
- City Reaffirms Santa Monica Airport Closure at End of 2028 as JSX Lease Considered (press release, 26 Sept 2025) — City of Santa Monica · openA
- The Macerich Company FY2025 Form 10-K (property table; Santa Monica Place loan default and receivership) — US Securities and Exchange Commission / The Macerich Company · openA
- BXP, Inc. FY2025 Form 10-K (Item 2 property table; joint ventures; Santa Monica Business Park mortgage) — US Securities and Exchange Commission / BXP, Inc. · openA
- Douglas Emmett FY2025 Form 10-K (Schedule III; multifamily portfolio by submarket; principal office) — US Securities and Exchange Commission / Douglas Emmett · openA
- Kilroy Realty FY2025 Form 10-K (stabilized portfolio table; 2025 dispositions) — US Securities and Exchange Commission / Kilroy Realty · openA
- Loews Corporation FY2025 Form 10-K (no mention of Santa Monica) — US Securities and Exchange Commission / Loews Corporation · openA
- Building Permits Survey, annual 2025 place file, West Region (we2025a.txt) — Santa Monica row — US Census Bureau · openA