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Los Angeles County Shopping Center Abandoned for Decades Goes Up for Sale

Cushman & Wakefield Is Marketing Hawthorne Mall, Seen in Movies ‘Gone Girl’ and ‘Tenet’
An aerial showing the 25-acre Hawthorne Mall at 12000 Hawthorne Blvd. in Hawthorne, California. The mall, which has been shuttered since 1999, has been listed for sale as a large redevelopment opportunity. (Cushman & Wakefield)
An aerial showing the 25-acre Hawthorne Mall at 12000 Hawthorne Blvd. in Hawthorne, California. The mall, which has been shuttered since 1999, has been listed for sale as a large redevelopment opportunity. (Cushman & Wakefield)
CoStar News
October 16, 2023 | 10:09 P.M.

A Los Angeles County shopping center that has been closed since the 1990s but featured in television shows and movies has hit the market as developers target malls across the nation for other uses.

Owner The Charles Co., based in West Hollywood, is selling the 25-acre Hawthorne Mall at 12000 Hawthorne Blvd. in Hawthorne, California, according to a statement by Cushman & Wakefield, which was hired to sell the property. The enclosed mall, formerly named Hawthorne Plaza, was built in the 1970s before closing in 1999. It measures 935,025 square feet.

Retail centers across the U.S. have been turned into new properties including apartments in response to excess shopping center space nationally. Last month, a Dallas investor bought the 1 million-square-foot Valencia Town Center in Santa Clarita with plans to convert the space into other uses.

A Charles Co. representative declined to comment to CoStar News as to why it's selling the property. Hawthorne Mall is being listed without a price, and the seller is willing to provide financing, according to the statement. The site may attract developers interested in converting it into housing, commercial offices, light industrial, studio and production uses, or medical offices, according to the statement.

The shuttered mall's interior has been used in multiple television shows and movies including "Minority Report," "Westworld," "Gone Girl" and "Tenet."

"Hawthorne Mall represents one of the largest redevelopment opportunities in the Greater Los Angeles market," Cushman & Wakefield Vice Chair Mike Condon Jr. said in the statement.

The mall features a two-story retail shopping structure with about 915,000 square feet of space along with a roughly 20,000-square-foot office building, according to the statement. The property also has parking garages, subterranean parking and surface parking.

Hawthorne Mall opened in early 1977 with three anchor stores, including a J.C. Penney. However, the mall faced financial struggles soon after due to the loss of jobs in the area and competition with newer nearby malls. The mall was looted and damaged during the 1992 Los Angeles riots.

After closing in 1999, Hawthorne Mall has been envisioned as a redevelopment site but plans have yet to come to fruition. In December 2022, Charles Co. co-founder Arman Gabaee was sentenced to 48 months in federal prison after offering to buy a home for a Los Angeles County official in exchange for the official's help signing a $45 million lease at Hawthorne Mall, according to a statement by the U.S. attorney's office.

Since the mall's closing, the city of Hawthorne has seen numerous investments by companies including SpaceX, Tesla and Ring. The city is roughly 13 miles southwest of downtown Los Angeles in the region's South Bay area.

For the Record

In addition to Condon, Cushman & Wakefield's Erica Finck, McKenna Gaskill and Kylie Rawn are marketing the mall for sale.

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