Posted July 2026 | By Eric Engelbert
A Major Apartment Project Is Coming to Newport Beach's Koll Center
One of Newport Beach's best-known corporate addresses is about to get its first residential neighbors. The Picerne Group has approval to build 312 apartments at 4400 Von Karman Avenue, inside the Koll Center Newport business park near John Wayne Airport. The project is called the Residences at 4400 Von Karman, and it has been years in the making, navigating approvals, legal challenges, and appeals before finally clearing the way for construction.
For buyers and renters watching the Newport Beach market, this project is worth knowing about. Koll Center is one of the most recognizable commercial addresses in Orange County, home to corporate tenants including Hyundai Motor Company, Wells Fargo, and The Pacific Club. Adding 312 apartments to that environment represents a meaningful shift in how the area functions, and signals broader change coming to the airport corridor of Newport Beach.
Project Details: What Is Being Built
The Residences at 4400 Von Karman will occupy approximately 13 acres within the professional and business office portion of Koll Center Newport. The site is bordered by Birch Street to the northeast and Von Karman Avenue to the west. It wraps around, but does not include, the existing 11-story office building at 5000 Birch Street or several other low- and mid-rise office buildings in the immediate area.
The project is not a simple infill building on a vacant lot. It involves a full reconfiguration of surface parking lots that currently serve the surrounding office campus, replacing that pavement with residential and public amenity space.
| Residential Units | 312 apartments |
|---|---|
| Parking - Residential | 825-space structure integrated below the apartments |
| Parking - Office Campus | Separate 284-space free-standing structure to replace displaced surface lots |
| Public Park | Approximately 1 acre, included as part of the project |
| Site Size | Approximately 13 acres |
| Location | Koll Center Newport, between Von Karman Ave and Birch St |
| City Approval | January 2021 |
| Legal Clearance | July 2023 (appellate court) |
The one-acre public park included in the project is a notable feature. It is not a private amenity for residents only, but a public space required as part of the development agreement. That is a meaningful addition to a part of Newport Beach that is otherwise almost entirely commercial.
What Is Koll Center Newport?
Koll Center Newport is one of Orange County's signature corporate office parks. It was developed by The Koll Company, founded by Donald M. Koll in 1962, which grew into one of the largest real estate development and management firms in the western United States. The Newport Beach campus spans a large footprint near John Wayne Airport and is made up of low-, mid-, and high-rise office buildings ranging from one to fifteen stories, surrounded by surface parking and ornamental landscaping.
For decades, Koll Center has been primarily an employment hub. Major corporations and professional services firms occupy the campus alongside smaller tenants. The area has excellent freeway access, proximity to the airport, and is close to Fashion Island and Newport Center. What it has not had is housing. The conversion of surface parking and underutilized land within the campus into residential is part of a broader effort by Newport Beach to meet state housing mandates in areas that already have jobs and infrastructure.
Newport Beach identified the airport area as one of its primary housing opportunity zones in its state-required Housing Element. The Von Karman project fits directly into that framework, adding density to an area already served by roads, utilities, and employment, rather than pushing growth into residential neighborhoods.
The Road to Approval: Years of Legal Challenges
The Residences at 4400 Von Karman was not a smooth path from approval to groundbreaking. After the Newport Beach City Council approved the project in January 2021, Olen Properties, a major commercial real estate firm controlled by billionaire Igor Olenicoff that owns office buildings within and adjacent to Koll Center, filed suit against the city under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). Olen argued the city had not adequately analyzed the potential impacts of the project on traffic, noise, and air quality.
In March 2022, Orange County Superior Court Judge William Claster denied Olen's petition and ruled that the city's environmental review was adequate. Olen appealed. In July 2023, the appellate court upheld the trial court's ruling, clearing the project to proceed. The combined litigation was estimated to have cost approximately $10 million and took more than two years to resolve.
Housing advocates characterized the lawsuits as an example of existing commercial property owners using CEQA to block residential development that would increase competition for office tenants and parking in the area. The courts ultimately sided with the project and the city's environmental review process.
About the Developer: The Picerne Group
The Picerne Group is a Newport Beach-based real estate investment and development firm founded in 1988 by Kenneth Picerne. The firm manages its projects entirely in-house, from entitlement through construction and long-term property management. Picerne's stated approach is to build communities they intend to hold permanently, rather than develop and sell.
Their completed flagship project in Newport Beach is One Uptown Newport on Jamboree Road, a 462-unit luxury apartment community that opened in December 2019 as Phase I of the 25-acre Uptown Newport master plan. Developed in partnership with Shopoff Realty Investments, the community includes 92 affordable units and represents the largest new apartment delivery Newport Beach had seen in years at the time it opened.
Beyond Newport Beach, Picerne's Southern California portfolio includes Blu in Laguna Niguel, Eleven10 in Orange, Aria in Cerritos, Kaia in Lomita, and Vistara in Ontario. In addition to the Von Karman project, Picerne has two more Newport Beach apartments approved and moving forward: 312 units at 1300 Bristol Street North and 229 units at 1400 Bristol Street, both near John Wayne Airport and connected by a pedestrian bridge. When all three projects are complete, Picerne will have added well over 1,000 new apartments to Newport Beach in roughly a decade.
What This Means for Newport Beach Real Estate
The Koll Center area has historically attracted workers who then commute elsewhere to live, because housing options within Newport Beach are limited and expensive. Putting 312 apartments inside one of the city's major employment centers changes that dynamic. Residents at the Von Karman project would be able to walk to work at Koll Center or reach John Wayne Airport in minutes.
For investors watching multifamily in Orange County, the airport submarket of Newport Beach has produced strong rental fundamentals historically. Employment density, airport access, and proximity to Fashion Island and the beaches support demand for rental housing in this corridor. The addition of new luxury inventory at scale can temporarily shift comparable rents, but strong employment absorption in the area has typically sustained rents over time.
For buyers considering the broader Newport Beach area, projects like this are worth tracking as indicators of where the city's housing inventory is growing. Newport Beach has historically resisted density, and the concentration of new apartment projects in the airport corridor reflects both state housing law pressure and the practical reality that this is where the infrastructure already exists.
Looking to Buy or Rent in Newport Beach?
We track new development projects and market conditions across Newport Beach and Orange County. If you are buying, selling, or looking for a rental in the area, we can give you a current picture of what is available and what is coming to market.
Search Newport Beach rentals | Search homes for sale in Newport Beach | View all OC new developments
