Kaufland lists nine assets from its Australian development pipeline
A month after making the shock announcement that it wouldn’t open in Australia after four years of planning – German supermarket chain Kaufland has moved to sell nine sites from its substantial development pipeline.
The “strategically located” properties, with various zonings, are speculated to trade for a total of about $250 million, but this could not be confirmed with the marketing agent, Colliers International managing director, Capital Markets and Investment Services, John Marasco.
Four of the retailer’s offerings are in Melbourne, including in Chirnside Park, a 3.9 hectare Commercial 1 gazetted parcel which could make way for a complex containing residential.
Brisbane’s Morayfield Village Shopping Centre, which Kaufland only bought last August with the intention of refitting as a store – is also part of the portfolio.
“This is an unprecedented opportunity to secure a national pipeline of prime development sites, all of which are strategically located in growth areas that offer substantial upside,” Mr Marasco said.
“Rarely do we see such a significant value-add opportunity come to market in Australia”.
The agency’s director of Industrial Capital Markets, Alysia Reilly, added that interest has been received from local and offshore institutions, developers, owner occupiers and syndicates.
Many of the properties Kaufland acquired to turn into what it calls “hypermarkets” are former Bunnings outlets.
The retailer entered the Australian property market in 2017 with the purchase of Adelaide’s former Le Cornu furniture outlet in Forrestville (a property which is now for sale).
Initial plans by Kaufland to open its first stores in 2019 were pushed forward to this year.
Last March it acquired a 28 hectare industrial site in Melbourne’s north on which it planned to build a distribution centre with an end value of $459 million. In July it turned the first sod for the logistics complex, at a publicised event.
The decision not to open in Australia shocked local staff, some which were on garden leave having quit senior positions with rivals.
Kaufland is seeking to sell as part of the portfolio offered this week:
- 177-207 Reedy Creek Rd, Burleigh Heads, Queensland: a 3.3 hectare mixed-use zoned former Bunnings outlet which cost it $19.7 million in 2018;
- Morayfield Village at 177-189 Morayfield Rd, Morayfield, Queensland: on 1.7 hectares, the 6939 sqm shopping centre with 260 car parks is within Brisbane’s northern growth corridor;
- 159-177 Progress Rd, Richlands, Queensland: a 3.1 hectare District Centre zoned development site in Brisbane’s western growth corridor;
- 10 Anzac Hwy, Forestville, South Australia: a 3.6 hectare former furniture outlet near the Adelaide CBD. Within the affluent City of Unley, this site has been cleared of improvements;
- 250B Churchill Rd, Prospect, South Australia: a 2.4 hectare cleared and remediated property, zoned mixed-use;
- 266 Maroondah Hwy, Chirnside Park, Victoria, which Mr Marasco describes as “one of the last remaining infill sites of scale in Melbourne’s east”;
- 1-5 Gladstone Road, Dandenong, Victoria: a 3.1 hectare infill plot.
- 592-694 High Street, Epping, Victoria: spreads 3.15 hectares within the retail core of an activity centre. More than 30,000 vehicles pass this site daily, and
- 1126 Centre Road, Oakleigh South, Victoria: A 4.4 hectare corner block in an industrial precinct.
