Former Wantirna Heights School sells to Oz Property Group for $9.7 million

EXCLUSIVE

The former Wantirna Heights School, in Melbourne’s east, has sold for $9.71 million.

Victoria’s Department of Education listed the 1.25 hectare site at 56 Kingloch Parade, Wantirna, in April.

It was deemed surplus to the government’s needs after closing in 2013.

In 2015, the department demolished all the school buildings before pushing through a rezoning which would allow for it to be replaced with housing.

Colliers International offered the property with a Development Plan Overlay, allowing an incoming owner more density than the General Residential gazetting the block currently has within the City of Knox planning scheme.

As well as residential developers, agents Hamish Burgess, Jun Lai and Joe Kairouz targeted aged care accommodation providers.

Ironically, schools were also the agents’ radar.

It is understood to be selling to Richmond-based Oz Property Group, whose other projects include a Balaclava townhouse development and 21-level Flemington apartment building, Equinox.

Oz Property Group also builds hotels.

This site at 321 Wantirna Road (highlighted), sold for $9.7 million in 2015 – a Wantirna record given its zoning, until Colliers International sold 56 Kingloch Parade last week.

The Kingloch Parade deal is the largest for a General Residential Zone 1 property in Wantirna – pipping the $9.7 million watermark set in 2015 when a 1.01 hectare parcel at 321 Wantirna Road (pictured, right) exchanged.

Wantirna is about 23 kilometres from the Melbourne CBD.

Last August we reported that the Jenkins family sold a 14.96 hectare former apple orchard in the suburb for about $100 million.

Elsewhere in the middle-eastern suburbs, the Department of Education sold the former Boronia Heights High School earlier this year.

This property was the most valuable of six, listed last August by the state government as part of its Inclusionary Housing Pilot.

The 8.2 hectare ex-Boronia school was expected to contribute about $35 million to the portfolio’s $90 million value.

In May, we reported that the Department of Education reaped $8.2 million selling the former Calder Rise Primary School in Keilor, about 18 kilometres north-west of the city.

The vendor banked another $12 million selling the 5.3 hectare former William Ruthven Secondary College in Reservoir as an industrial development site.

Reservoir is about 12 kilometres north of the CBD.

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Marc Pallisco

A former property analyst and print journalist, Marc is the publisher of realestatesource.com.au.