Federal government unveils $400m quarantine facility at Melbourne’s Mickleham
THE federal government this week unveiled plans for a $400 million quarantine facility in Melbourne’s north.
The project for a site in Donnybrook Road was foreshadowed by The Age in May after the Gillard government paid the joint venture owners, developers AMP Capital and Folkestone, about $40 million for the 144 hectare parcel – marked as Stage 1 in the image, right.
The land had previously been earmarked for an industrial and business park.
To be developed by the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, the Mickleham facility will hold imported animals – from cats and dogs to alpacas – as well as plants.
ONE of Sydney’s most exclusive suburbs is about to see a rise in apartment skyscraper activity.
A prominent Surfers Paradise office tower has been withdrawn from the market.
NEW figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics show 60,000 fewer first home buyers entered the mortgage market for the year to May.
PERTH-based property developer Luke Saracini is looking for new financial backer to help get a 900-unit mixed use redevelopment in the Busselton area moving.
ONE has to wonder what “great Australian dream” some Melburnians were being sold last century.
FAST food giant McDonalds will shuts its three Iceland stores next weekend.
Orchard Funds Management has offloaded another CBD property, this time in Canberra.
FORZA Capital, the new investment vehicle created by breakaway Drapac senior directors Ashley Wain and Adam Murchie have made another commercial property play – paying $20.6 million for a low-rise office with redevelopment potential adjacent to the Exhibition Gardens and Melbourne Museum.
THE Perth-based Property Bank Australia has paid $15.6 million for a North Sydney commercial investment.
GOLD Coast’s Chevron Renaissance Shopping Centre (pictured, right) has been listed for sale.
THE sleepy Western Australia coastal town of Geraldton is about to undergo a population explosion – and maybe an apartment development boom – on the back of major mining projects including the $5 billion Oakajee Port venture.
LAND Management Corporation, controlled by the South Australian government, has released for sale a 200 hectare site at Blakeview, in Adelaide’s north.
MELBOURNE’s once booming real-estate market has finally decelerated – and for the first time in a long time, buyers are calling the shots.
LEND Lease’s “institutional flagship fund” APPF Commercial has reportedly acquired a small interest within the first two skyscrapers that will form part of the $6 billion Barangaroo project on Sydney Harbour.
AFTER what has been a largely bleak economic backdrop, the country’s most affordable suburbs are performing better than its ritziest.
WESTERN Australia’s residential building boom seeks to be choking on itself.
INTERESTS associated with retail mogul Gerry Harvey will pay $31.8 million for a half stake in an Adelaide bulky goods complex the Gepps Cross Centre.
THIRTY years ago a three-bedroom house in Thomastown cost more than a three-bedroom house in Fitzroy – that’s testament to how much Melbourne’s attitude to housing has changed.
RECEIVERS for pub group Cornerstone may have recovered another million from the sale of two pubs, put to the market last month, and after Collingwood’s “Tote” hotel failed to find a buyer.
THE cash-strapped Baillieu government is some $5.5 million richer after selling a prominent Parkville property to developers.
FINASUCRE, from Belgium, is looking to expand its Queensland land bank.
TONY Abbott is leading an investigation into foreign ownership of Australian property particularly farms), after a wave of complaints from agents and farmers that the current rules for offshore investors is resulting in much of the country being sold unbeknownst to the Foreign Investment Review Board.
THE Australian arm of the Canadian private equity company Brookfields plans to build an office building in Perth, abutting another development it already owns – in effect creating a twin-tower complex.
THE FUTURE Fund has paid £200 million ($A375 million) for a stake in UK’s most visited regional shopping centre, The Bullring, in Birgmingham.
IT WILL be the end of an era in Port Melbourne next spring, when Circus Oz plans to cross town.
GREAT Eagle Group, the listed Hong Kong property company has paid about $40 million for the Observatory Hotel in Sydney (pictured, right).
NATURAL disasters in key markets, a strong $A encouraging Australians to travel overseas, and prospective visitors seeking cheaper destinations, have contributed to a slowdown in the country’s tourist accommodation sector.
TWO South Australian shopping centres have sold for a total of just over $41 million.
THE Sunshine West headquarters of troubled trucking company 1st Fleet, which shut its doors last month, has quietly been listed for lease by its ASX-listed owner, Valad Property Group.
REAL Estate website www.realestate.com.au is being investigated by the Australian Competition and Consumer Comission for its advertising pricing.
RECEIVERS are about to seize control of a sixth site controlled by embattled property developer Luke Saraceni (right).
SOUTH Australia’s government is calling for concept plans to redevelop the Adelaide Convention Centre.
THE New South Wales state transport department has paid $48.5 million for a prominent suburban office park in Sydney, which it will bulldoze, as part of its $8.5 billion North-West Rail Link project.
LEIGHTON Properties with Ipswich City Properties have lodged plans to build an office building within the $1 billion Ipswich City Heart development (proposal image, right).
STOCKLAND has paid $22 million for three retirement villages.
THE palatial Perth mansion of businessman Ric Stowe is expected to be auctioned in May.
ADELAIDE’s prominent 1 King William Street office has sold for $38.64 million.
RETAIL giant Target has leased 4462 square metres of office space on Melbourne city-fringe office market, St Kilda Road.
A NEWLY formed consortium including Woolworths and hotel industry veteran Arthur Laundy have made their first major property play in southern Sydney.
THREE major industrial deals have been signed in major Australian cities.