Ventura County market shows an overall improvement after a generally poor 1991.

Conditions improved in all sectors of Ventura County's real estate market during the first quarter of 1992 after a generally poor 1991.

Brokers and office managers in the office, industrial and housing markets all pointed to increased activity and other signs that could indicate the beginning of a market turnaround.

"Generally, across all of the specialties -- office, industrial and retail and even in investment -- we're beginning to see activity increasing since the first of the year," said Thad W. Seligman, Grubb & Ellis senior vice president and district manager.

Tim Grant, a CB Commercial Real Estate Group Inc. senior associate specializing in office buildings, said a "new and positive trend" was established in the west Ventura County market in the first quarter.

Grant said the vacancy rate for professional office space in the coastal plain cities of Ventura, Oxnard and Camarillo decreased in the first quarter for the fourth consecutive quarter. Available office space was reduced by more than 37,000 square feet in the first quarter of this year and by nearly 100,000 square feet in the last year, he said.

Seligman said the increased commercial activity initially "was just people out looking."

But now, he noted, "those lookers are starting to translate into transactions. We're beginning to now see deals start to get signed, and so we think the absorption for the second quarter is going to be significantly better than it was in the fourth quarter of last year and the first quarter of this year."

Seligman said the market absorbed about 40,000 square feet of space during the first quarter and the vacancy rate declined by 0.6 of a percent to 25.5 percent.

Grant pegged the vacancy rate at 23.9 percent, down from the all-time high of 27 percent a year ago, but still up from the 12.4 percent of 1989's second quarter.

Seligman said one factor spurring activity was all of the publicity about how the market favors tenants.

"There's been so much written about it being a tenants' market that (prospective tenants have) come out to see if it's true. I think they're finding out that we've pretty much bottomed out and that rents have pretty much settled as low as they're going to," he said.

Seligman said leasing was brisk among small users of 500 to 800 square feet, although tenants of 2,000 to 5,000 square feet constitute most of the Ventura market.

NCEC Realty, for example, recently named Grubb & Ellis to lease its 110,000-square-foot North Coast Executive Center in Oxnard.

Seligman said the $17 million project, now 40 percent leased, is the first office building to be finished in the initial 30-acre phase of Oxnard Town Center. He said an office build-out program will feature suites ranging from 1,200 to 2,500 square feet.

Grubb & Ellis reported the most activity in Westlake Village and the Conejo area during the first quarter, but that could change if some big deals go through on the Oxnard plain in the second quarter.

"We see a strong possibility in this next quarter of two big users who are looking on the plain, one that is looking for about 110,000 square feet and one for about 40,000 square feet that could significantly affect the market for office space," Seligman said.

He said that compared to the office market, the industrial sector was sluggish, with only about 80,000 square feet of absorption in the quarter and rents dropping by 10 percent to 15 percent since December.

Seligman said the retail vacancy rate remained steady at about 9.7 percent, compared with 5 percent about five years ago.

"But a lot has been built and the vacancy is really the result of a poor economy and a lot of small, mom-and-pop retailers that just couldn't survive," Seligman said.

According to Grant, the leasing market is affecting the sales of commercial buildings in two ways: First, lower rents have reduced the projected rate of return for buyers. Second, tenants who might otherwise buy buildings to escape high lease rates are instead continuing to lease because they can negotiate lower rates.

According to Grant, 1992 will remain a tenants' and buyers' market because of the high volume of space available, enabling space users to exact generous concessions.

He said it is "too early to sound the alarm that market conditions will turn dramatically against the tenant, but it is not unforeseeable either." The best advice is to "secure a favorable transaction now, while conditions are right," he said.

In the housing market, George Kite, president of the Ventura Board of Realtors, said activity is "running at about twice the pace it was at this time last year."

Kite said home sales totaled between 150 and 160 a month for the first two months of the year, compared with an average of 113 a month in 1991, when the total sold for the year was 1,360 homes.

"I attribute this to the interest rates hitting their lowest level in the end of December and the beginning of January," Kite said. After interest rates rose slightly, he said, "A lot of people realized they missed the boat by trying to get in at the very bottom, so they decided to move now before rates rise further."

Said Kite: "At the weekend open houses we're seeing lots of activity. I had four new listings in the last two weeks that sold within three days with backup offers. Of course, they were well priced. If people over-price them by about 3 or 4 percent, they'll sit on the market for 100 days. But if they price them right, they'll sell quickly."

Like his counterparts in the commercial real estate market, Kite said he is hopeful but careful not to read too much into the first quarter's performance.

"We're all cautiously optimistic here because we're not sure this is going to last and we always get a burst of activity in the first part of the year," he said. "We're just trying to make hay while the sun shines, so to speak."