Blacktown hotel sells for $25m
Bob McGhee has sold Blacktown’s Adam’s Tavern after three decades.
The hotel and bottle shop on 1867 square metres at 61 Richmond Road, opposite Blacktown Showground, has collected $25 million from another veteran publican, Peter Walker.
The deal comes nearly two years since Sam Arnaout’s Iris Capital paid Paul Irvin Hotel Group, which is directed by John Irvin, $23.4m for the nearby Sportsman’s Hotel, on 1.62 hectares – the then suburb record price for an asset of this type.
Both venues came with 30 electronic gambling machines; Mr McGhee increased the capacity of his from 23 in 2016.
Mr Walker also holds the Doonside Hotel in the next suburb west of Blacktown.
Four months ago, he banked $24m selling Leichhardt’s Norton Irish Pub to Justin Hemmes’ Merivale.
Adam’s Tavern
Adam’s Tavern includes a public bar, bistro, beer garden and gaming room with TAB services.
The bottle-shop, which trades from 9am-11pm, is drive-through.
There is also a function space.
JLL’s John Musca and Kate Macdonald brokered the off-market sale.
“The owner was one of the last remaining Western Sydney owner-operators in a climate where independent single hotel ownership is diminishing,” Ms Macdonald said.
“We know that a decision like this doesn’t come lightly, however the timing from a family objective aspect and strength of the market seemed to align” (story continues below).
Mr McGhee added “I wish the new owner…a long-time friend, all the very best and I’m confident he will do very well”.
String of deals
Blacktown is 34 kilometres west of Sydney.
In Emu Plains, about 25km further in that direction, Redcape Hotel Group, which could be in the process of delisting, recently paid FAL Group $30.5m for the O’Donoghue’s Hotel.
Also with 30 electronic gambling machines, that deal included a retail component and 5500 sqm undeveloped tract.
The nearby Macquarie Tavern, in Liverpool, traded for $43m last August.
That buyer, the De Angelis family, the matriarch of which (Robyn De Angelis) is high profile publican Arthur Laundy’s sister, in 2016 paid Lantern Hotel Group $25.6m for the Uncle Bucks Hotel at Mount Druitt, not far from Blacktown.
More recent west and south-west Sydney hotel transactions include:
- The General Gordon Hotel, which was picked up in February by John Feros’ JDA Hotels for c$30m;
- Narwee Hotel, acquired by Iris Capital last December for $45m;
- The Royal Hotel at Ryde, which traded to former Wallaby Bill Young for $37m in March;
- In the outer south west, Marlow Hotel Group last month snapped up the Camden Hotel for $12m.
In March Mr Laundy broke ground on a refurbishment of Penrith’s Log Cabin Hotel.
“The tumultuous ownership experiences across the hospitality sector since the onset of COVID have no doubt given rise to some resetting of many generational hotelier family outlooks,” Mr Musca said following the Adam’s Tavern sale.
“It is…in conjunction with an extraordinary weight of capital to the asset-class and as a result, the strongest pricing outcomes seen in over two decades of hotel transactions,” he added.
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