A Ventura County investment group plans to build a 24-unit apartment complex at 72 W. Santa Clara St., on the site of a former bakery. (courtesy rendering)

A Ventura County investment group has purchased a former Wonder Bread bakery site in downtown Ventura and plans to build a 24-unit luxury apartment complex there.

The property at 72 W. Santa Clara St. was sold for just over $1 million, according to Colliers International, which represented both parties in the deal.

“City officials decided that they needed to address the shortage of housing that nearly every small municipality is facing in the wake of six straight years of recession and weak recovery,” Jesse Munoz, a broker with Colliers who represented both buyer and seller in the deal, said in a statement. “While 24 units do not a recovery make, it is another sign that investors are ready to jump back into well-located residential properties for the right price.”

The buyer was a joint venture between Moorpark-based Dansk Investment Group and Westlake Village-based The Daly Group. The seller was United American Properties, an Orange County firm. The building that once housed the Wonder Bread bakery was razed years ago to make way for a parking lot that was then leased for “a nominal sum,” Colliers said, until United American could decide to do with the site, which spans nearly half an acre near the Ventura County Fairgrounds.

The new owners plan to build a 24-unit apartment complex in a Mission architectural style. The project will feature three levels of housing on top of ground-level parking, Colliers said.

The site is partially entitled, the firm said. “There won’t be any big surprises with this builder,” Munoz said. “The joint-venture partners have both worked with the city before, and the city has already approved the site as a low-density, multi-family site.”

Fifteen offers were made on the property, Colliers noted. “Land prices dictate the amount and type of housing available in California,” Munoz said in a statement. “What is possible in Ventura is not in places where land values are much higher and building limitations more restrictive — like Malibu and Montecito.”