Local Domain Setup – How to Set Up a Local Domain like local.test

The domains in the search directive should be separated by whitespace only, not commas. So replace

search loc1.sitea.example.net, loc2.sitea.example.net, loc1siteb.example.net

with

search loc1.sitea.example.net loc2.sitea.example.net loc1siteb.example.net

and try it again. Note that in general it is better supported if you set these things up via System Preferences and then you don't get syntax problems like this.

System Preferences -> Network -> [Select the interface from the list on the left] -> Advanced... -> DNS -> Search Domains:

All additional entries to the HOSTS file must be above the:

fe80::1%lo0

Make sure there is at least one line break after the last entry. Like so:

127.0.0.1 LLL.localhost
127.0.0.1 LLL.localhost
#

Although you probably can't tell, there is another line following the # symbol. One more thing to mention, using Space instead of Tab between 127.0.0.1 and localhost might help too.