Australian Real Estate News
QUEENSLAND based Devine Limited has purchased a 107-unit apartment complex in the fringe Brisbane suburb of Teneriffe, and a 22 hectare standard residential development site in Melton, in Melbourne’s outer west. Marketing for both projects is expected to start this year, according to Devine managing director David Keir who released the company’s financials last week.
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DESPITE a slowdown in new house sales, developers are continuing to build up a landbank on Melbourne’s outskirts, and some farmers have never been happier.
This month, growing local developer Greencor paid $26 million for a 57-hectare farm on Bodycoats Road in Wollert, 27 kilometres north of town, between Craigieburn and Doreen.
Marketed as ”the last big one”, and with the potential to be subdivided into about 900 lots, the property adjoins other farms recently acquired by major developers including Sydney-based, ASX listed giant Stockland, the state government’s development arm, Places Victoria, and Evolve Development, part directed by Melbourne millionaire and former Fairfax Media chairman Ron Walker.
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FOR Melbourne’s newest millionaire farmer, the west has proven lucky in more ways than one, with Perth-based development giant Golden Group revealed as the buyer to pay $36 million for the Tarneit farm once known as Shanahans House, and later, Wyndham Park.
The 64 hectare estate, some 28 kilometres of town at 1070 Sayers Road, was one of the first major farms publicly listed for sale after the former state government significantly expanded Melbourne’s Urban Growth Boundary by some 46,000 hectares last June.
That expansion, which built on a 23,000 hectare expansion a year earlier, allowed for new homes to be developed on what was previously Green Wedge land, parkland and rural zoned properties.
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THE street may share the same name as redundant, pro-development Planning Minister Justin Madden.
But around ritzy Madden Grove, Kew, residents value the character of their streets – and are prepared to pay to avoid being overrun by medium density development.
In an extraordinary deal, a local resident has paid a speculated $9 million for the former University of Melbourne Early Childhood Development campus, which the school sold 12 years ago, and was to become that suburb’s next major apartment complex.
The imposing property at 6 – 12 Madden Grove has been handpassed to a variety of developers since 1999. What was a 4973 square metre campus that started at #2, was sliced to become a 3502 square metre site, which was offered for sale late last year.
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IT’S bad enough if the site next-door to the one you just bought gets listed for sale, targeting developers.
It’s worse when you just spent $21 million of taxpayer money, and if the redevelopment next door robs the million dollar views you planned to exploit in your own marketing.
Sadly this is what’s happening on the Footscray waterfront right now.
Read moreADVANCE to Clyde-Five Ways Road, about 45 kilometres from town, if you want to know where Melbourne’s south-east suburbs have sprawled to – and will soon overrun.
A swag of farms and major homestead estates listed for sale along the soon-to-be-major road last year, sold over the festive break.
The “farm sale” trend is not novel to the south-east, where large parcels are also selling around Langwarrin, Pearcedale and Skye.
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QUEENSLAND-based property developer David Devine is wasting no time getting back into the Melbourne development scene.
Four months since retiring from the listed development giant he established in 1983 – now known as Devine Limited – Mr Devine’s newest incarnation, Metro Property Development, has paid $10.2 million for an eight hectare site in Doreen.
The land, at 60 Orchard Road, on the corner of Garden Road, will be subdivided into about 150 lots and carry an average block price of about $200,000. Assuming homes worth $250,000 are developed on each block, Metro’s Doreen project could have an end value of close to $70 million.
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HOME builder Swenrick Constructions is offloading its south-east Melbourne headquarters ahead of a relocation.
The 6738 square metre Springvale supersite, with street addresses of 782 – 794 Princes Highway and 2 – 4 Hillside Street (image, right), is used by Swenrick as offices and display suites. It’s spread over nine adjoining titles.
It’s expected to sell for between $4 and $4.5 million, and be redeveloped into a medium density townhouse or apartment project with an end value of about $50 million.
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VICROADS – whose days headquartered from dank offices in one of Melbourne’s ritziest suburbs are reportedly numbered – is expecting some $15 million from the sale of a 31.3 hectare residential development site on what is now Melbourne’s northern outskirts, but will soon be considered a middle-ring suburb.
The Craigieburn site with a street address of 650 Hume Highway, is spread over two sides of the recently opened Hume Freeway*, which connects commuters to the Western Ring Road and the CBD in one direction, or the Metropolitan Ring Road, and a Greensborough traffic jam at the other.
The Melbourne-Sydney railway line dissects the southern edge of both VicRoads sites, some 25 kilometres from town.
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ONE of the northern suburb’s most controversial residential development sites has sold for $6.7 million.
The vacant AMF Northcote Bowl complex at 166 – 174 Victoria Street, on the north-east corner of Separation Street, was listed for sale by Hong Kong based conglomerate Far East Consortium last October.
It paid Macquarie $5 million for the 4716 square metre site in early 2009, and shortly after, convinced VCAT to approve a permit which would see the distinctive centre demolished and replaced with 73 flats and 18 townhouses.
One of the proposal’s criticisms was that the busy intersection, with thin roads, would be even more overrun with cars. Others argue the site’s previous use as a bowling centre would have contributed somewhat to the traffic in the area.
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DESPITE fears Melbourne’s $4.3 billion regional rail link might be shelved, Australia’s biggest developers are exploiting last year’s Urban Growth Boundary changes, continuing to quietly snap up farmland in Melbourne’s mid-west.
This time, in Plumpton, Sydney-based Delfin Lend Lease has paid about $30 million for an approximate 63 hectare site on Beattys Road.
The land was included within the revised UGB last year, and was understood to have been sold by Oliver Hume director – special projects, Peter Vassallo, who was unavailable for comment.
Toni Mills, head of Delfin Lend Lease, told The Saturday Age’s Capital Gain it planned to undergo a planning and community consultation process to determine the most appropriate vision for the site.
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WILLIAMSTOWN’s contaminated gasometer site, south west of Melbourne, sold to a developer for a speculated $3.5 million before a scheduled auction, earlier this month.
The new owner is expected to undertake remediation works before marketing a residential project, likely after 2012 sources say.
The spectacularly located 3583 square metre site at 87 – 93 Stevedore Street, near Williamstown’s retail centre, and the waterfront, abuts an open-air car park and supermarket.
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A DEVELOPER has paid $5.95 million for a 2.7 hectare site abutting a residential area in Maidstone, some eight kilometres west of the CBD. The former factory at 84 – 88 Mitchell Street is near the Maribyrnong suburb border, and within walking distance to the massive Highpoint Shopping Centre and Homemaker Centre. Longer term, it’s
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A HISTORIC West Melbourne building, once the headquarters of Mushroom Records, sold this week for $3.6 million. Currently configured as a double storey, 650 square metre office, 27 -31 Dudley Street is on a 613 square metre block and sold to a developer who is said to be considering a residential redevelopment in the medium
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THE timing of last week’s Urban Growth Boundary changes couldn’t have come at a better time for the syndicate of investors selling Melbourne’s biggest development site, measured by area.
The massive 555 hectare site at Truganina, in Melbourne’s west, is expected to sell for $100 million – after failing to sell for about that amount two years ago, at the start of the economic downturn, and before the site’s zoning future was confirmed.
“Under the rezoning the site will be a keystone property for the future development of Melbourne,” said CB Richard Ellis director Walter Occhiuto, who is selling the site with Tom Hayes, said.
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THE timing of last week’s Urban Growth Boundary changes couldn’t have come at a better time for the syndicate of investors selling Melbourne’s biggest development site, measured by area.
The massive 555 hectare site at Truganina, in Melbourne’s west, is expected to sell for $100 million – after failing to sell for about that amount two years ago, at the start of the economic downturn, and before the site’s zoning future was confirmed.
“Under the rezoning the site will be a keystone property for the future development of Melbourne,” said CB Richard Ellis director Walter Occhiuto, who is selling the site with Tom Hayes, said.
Read moreAND so the first of many development sites within the recently extended Urban Growth Boundary has hit the market, in Tarneit.
The 64 hectare farm – once known as Shanahans House, and later Wyndham Park – is expected to sell for about $25 to $30 million, sources say, and attract interest from “local, national and international residential developers”.
Jones Lang LaSalle said two upcoming infrastructure projects – including a new Tarneit train stations, and the Outer Metropolitan Ring Road – will contribute to council’s ambitions to boost Tarneit’s population by more than 21,000 by 2020.
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MELBOURNE’s biggest residential development site, measured by area, was quietly relisted for sale this week.
After failing to sell last year, the private families that control a 555 hectare block of land at 65 – 453 Hopkins Street, in Truganina, are trying their luck in a more buoyant market.
The land is near the new Western Freeway extension (known during construction as the Deer Park Bypass), which opened last year, and marries into the Western Highway at the suburb border of Caroline Springs, Ravenhall and Rockbank.
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DEVELOPERS and land owners are rubbing their hands with excitement at the prospect of a roundabout being developed at the Avenue of Honour in Bacchus Marsh, north-west of Melbourne.
Large tracts of used and disused farmland in the pockets around the proposed new road – including around Hopetoun Park, Parwan and Pentland Hills – are expected to be redeveloped as housing estates in coming years.
Tenders closed for one such site this week: the massive 168 hectare Underbank Stud Farm.
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Prestige builder Glenvill Projects Pty Ltd is speculated to be paying about $15 million for the former Joshua Pitt leather manufacturing site which spreads over two streets and 13,450 square metres of prime real estate in Melbourne’s inner-north.
Joshua Pitt has reportedly been based at the 52 – 79 Gadd Street, Northcote property for 121 years.
Glenvill is expected to redevelop the site into a major apartment complex but this could not be confirmed with managing director Len Warson, who was unavailable for comment.
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