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One of my favorite lists in the L.A. Business Journal is the annual rank of most valuable private property in Los Angeles County. My favorite fact in this week's report is that the county Assessor's computer can't handle properties with a value of $1 billion or more—it can only do nine digits. So #1 Getty Center is broken up into smaller parcels for tax purposes—and still shows up three times in the top 10:
1-Getty Center museum & research institute $2.2 billion
2-BP oil refinery, Carson $2.1 billion
3-Chevron refinery, El Segundo $2.0 billion
4-ExxonMobil refinery, Torrance $1.3 billion
5-Valero refinery, Wilmington $841 million
6-Getty Center offices $820 million
7-Anheuser Busch brewery, Van Nuys $758 million
8-ConocoPhillips plant, Wilmington $677 million
9-Getty Center vacant land $649 million
10-Cedars-Sinai Medical Center $599 million
The highest-valued studio property is Universal's CityWalk at $570 million (#12), followed by the studio itself at $514 million (#13). USC is valued at $434 million (#15). The only shopping mall in the top 25 is Westfield's Century City at $337 million (#20). This week's Business Journal also reports on a plan to build a pair of 47-story condo towers that would add 1,000 new residents to Century City.
Speaking of the Getty: Monday's Times carries a story saying that Getty Center CEO Barry Munitz interceded in a way that allowed friend and art patron Eli Broad to buy a valuable piece of Brentwood property from the Getty at a discount.