Primewest pays Charter Hall $91.5m for shopping centres at Greystanes and West Ryde

West Ryde Marketplace was built on the site of a former Norman Ross store. Primewest executive chairman John Bond’s late father, Alan, acquired the Norman Ross business in 1982. The vendor, Grace Brothers, had just purchased it from Gerry Harvey and the late Ian Norman – who established Harvey Norman, at Auburn, that same year.

Primewest has snapped up two more Sydney shopping centres for its newly mandated Australian Daily Needs trust.

The Pemulwuy and West Ryde marketplaces cost a total of $91.5 million from Charter Hall.

The purchaser will pool the two properties with Spring Farm Shopping Centre, for which it paid $34.75m in a deal reported last week, to seed the fund.

With the $34.75m purchase of Spring Farm Shopping Centre, reported last week, Primewest has three Woolworths-backed Sydney centres to seed its Australian Daily Needs trust.

Primewest is expecting Australian Daily Needs to hold a portfolio of neighbourhood retail assets worth about $300m.

The landlord’s executive chairman, John Bond, said “the company had a strong, established track record in the retail sector with more than $1 billion worth of daily needs convenience centre assets across Australia”.

Australian Daily Needs’ seed assets: in Sydney, anchored to Woolies

The Pemulwuy Marketplace (pictured, top) at 250 Greystanes Road, Greystanes, 30 kilometres from the city, occupies a 1.86 hectare block with 249 car parks.

Woolworths is the key tenant, but there are 17 more occupiers.

All up there’s 5125 sqm of lettable area and the weighted average lease expiry is 8.3 years.

Primewest executive chairman John Bond said this shopping centre “is in a tightly held, established location and offers strong medium to long term development potential as well as secure long-term income from Woolworths and…specialty tenants”.

The pricier West Ryde Marketplace, developed in 2005 on the site of a Waltons turned Norman Ross store at 14 Anthony Rd, is 16kms west of town (story continues below).

Also anchored to Woolworths, and with 22 smaller tenancies, the complex contains 6380 sqm of area.

Its weighted average lease expiry is 10.3 years.

“The centre is only 150 metres from the West Ryde train station and sits within the West Ryde Town Centre Revitalisation Scheme that is set to provide significant local planning initiatives,” Mr Bond added.

Spring Farm occupies a 2.1ha block about 60kms from the city.

With 4813 sqm of lettable area, Woolworths is the major occupier, too.

That sale was sealed on a 5.8 per cent yield.

Mr Bond said there is “already a solid pipeline of potential opportunities within the new retail trust, as well as other counter‐cyclical opportunities across Australia and potentially overseas”.

Established 25 years ago, Primewest’s manages properties worth a total of more than $4.5b, spread across Australia and the west coast of the United States of America.

As well as retail, the Perth-based investment house buys agricultural, industrial, office and residential real estate on behalf of stapled securities and investors in underlying funds.

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Marc Pallisco

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