Commercial and residential property news
MACQUARIE Group has agreed to lease a 19,500 square metre London and European head office at Canary Wharf.
UK-based real estate website propertyweek.com said Macquarie will relocate to a new project at Drapers Garden, Canary Wharf, from CityPoint, in 2011.
Macquarie will join he likes of Citigroup, Credit Suisse and HSBC in the heavily focussed financial service precinct.
Read moreKROME STUDIOS – the new name for the electronic games giant once known as Atari – has swapped its long
Read moreVICTORIA’s state governing body for soccer will relocate from a modest office in the middle of a northern suburb sports complex, to a relatively flash new headquarters in tree-lined St Kilda Road.
Football Federation Victoria has leased 845 square metres at Flight Centre’s 436 St Kilda Road office building, about five months ahead of the opening of the distinctive Rectangular Stadium, under construction on Olympic Boulevard, the new name for the part of Swan Street, west of Punt.
MELBOURNE born retailer The Reject Shop has issued a major leasing requirement to prospective landlords, in an attempt to further expand its national network.
The discount retailer, which last month reported an $18.9 million half-year profit, and has enjoyed a buoyant business because of the bleak economic backdrop, has targeted locations in every state and territory including the Northern Territory, the only major region it does not trade.
A leasing requirement document issued by the Reject Shop says its strategy is to grow by at least 20 stores a year.
Read morePRIVATE health insurer Defence Health can expect to make $6.5 million from the sale of a prominent St Kilda Road office within walking distance to the Flinders Street station.
Defence Health is the latest in a string of companies to list formerly owner-occupied buildings for sale, while it rents elsewhere.
Defence Health’s outgoing office three-level office at 344 St Kilda Road, opposite the Shrine of Remembrance is being marketed by Colliers International’s Ben Christie.
Read moreALMOST half of an unfinished Docklands office building will be offered for lease, after education service provider Global Campus Management – which agreed to lease space at 717 Bourke Street to accommodate fashion university ESMOD – went into voluntary administration last Thursday.
ESMOD was to have occupied 18,000 square metres of the distinctive 37,000 square metre building which will also be home to petroleum giant BP upon completion in July next year.
GCM is a minority shareholder in the Bourke Street building, on the south-west corner of Wurundjeri Way, which was developed by Babcock & Brown and architect Metier 3.
THE owners of the $750 million South Wharf development, at the point where Southbank meets Docklands, may have snared another major office tenant from St Kilda Road.
Car leasing giant Leaseplan is understood to have leased about 4,000 square metres at the 12-level South Wharf office tower, part of a massive riverfront development that also includes the new DFO South Wharf, and a 396-room Hilton Hotel.
AN 8,000 square metre slice of Elsternwick’s historic Rippon Lea estate, compulsorily acquired by the State Government in the 1950s for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation – is likely to be sold to residential developers, if the ABC vacates the property in 2012.
ABC project director Ray Moore told Secret Agent it is considering selling two Elsternwick properties, currently occupied as studios and offices, including a major complex on Gordon Street abutting Rippon Lea – built on what was once the property’s southern boundary.
FOUR months since selling to developers, the new owners of South Melbourne’s 41 – 49 Bank Street office – and long time home of Fairfax Media’s Southern Cross Broadcasting – have lodged plans to build a hotel and apartment complex on the site.
A spokeswoman for the Port Phillip Council said it is reviewing an application to demolish the existing building and construct a 16-level complex, which would include 126 apartments, 88 hotel suites, and a ground floor restaurant.
ADVERTISING mogul Harold Mitchell is building a new $30 million company headquarters on the prominent South Melbourne site his agency has occupied since the late 1980s.
The media specialist, who established Mitchell Communication Group in 1976, has demolished a double-storey building his agency previously occupied at 101 – 107 York Street, and will replace it with a 5-level, 5,100 square metre A-grade office, with several outdoor balconies, and city views.
The new Bruce Henderson Architect designed HQ will consolidate Mitchells staff from five offices around South Melbourne, including space it has temporarily leased for the period of construction, opposite the South Melbourne Market nearby.
Read more
HIGH end fashion retailer Tiffany & Co is about to embark on a major renovation of its 267 Collins Street store, estimated to be worth more than $15 million.
The move will see Tiffany’s relocate to former Qantas occupied space at 233 Collins Street, while its flagship retailer down the street is fully remodelled.
LEND Lease has been named as preferred builder, to develop Melbourne’s wholesale fruit, vegetable and flower market in Epping.
Victorian Major Project Minister Tim Pallas made the announcement today, saying the $870 million project will create about 600 jobs.
The move will also give the government a swag of inner-city land parcels to consider selling, or developing. Much of the land is located in Melbourne’s inner-west, between the Docklands precinct and Footscray.
Read moreA CBD building, offloaded by the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology five years ago, has been listed for sale this week as a major residential development site.
The 410 Elizabeth Street office, known to RMIT staff and students as Building 87, will be sold with a development permit for a 50-level apartment building, capable of accommodating hundreds of units.
The property is owned by developer Michael Buxton, who paid RMIT $8.25 million for the office in 2004, before working on obtaining a residential development permit.
TRAMS are being tested, and public transport users have less than a week to wait for the opening a new route connecting Collins Street to Merchant Street, an inland retail strip and a major part of Melbourne’s $12 billion Docklands redevelopment.
Merchant Street will connect the global headquarters of National Australia Bank, on the shores of Victoria Harbour, to the $620 million headquarters of ANZ Banking Group, which is nearing completion, on the banks of the Yarra River.
More than 10,000 white collar employees will relocate to Docklands over the next year, Knight Frank leasing agent Mark Rasmussen said, including staff from BP Australia, Fairfax Media, Myer, the Victorian Building Commission and VicUrban.
FOOD and beverage giant Kraft Foods will relocate its Melbourne staff from a Port Melbourne building originally built as a sophisticated British Aerospace research facility, to the $750 million South Wharf village, at the point where Southbank meets Docklands.
Kraft head of corporate affairs Simon Talbot confirmed it will lease 3,800 square metres of offices over two levels at the new South Wharf office building, and an additional 650 square metre balcony, which staff will use to entertain, and retreat.
PRIVATE developer Les Smith has found a tenant to occupy the whole top floor of a flash 4-level office, at 108 Power Street in Hawthorn, which he also decided to build without first finding a tenant.
Galvin Construction will relocate from nearby rundown offices in Lynch Street Hawthorn, to about 1,000 square metres at the building, which is due to open next month, across the road from Vantage, a major 14,000 square metre office at the corner of Burwood Road.
The St Kilda Road office building that is home to the Consulate General of the US in Melbourne, is fully leased for the first time since the September 11 terrorist attacks almost eight years ago.
Insurance giant AIA Group has leased 4,230 square metres at 553 St Kilda Road, filling the 8-level office.
MIRVAC is understood to be close to selling a suburban office building for about $7.75 million.
Sources say the Sydney-based developer, which last week announced a $1.08 billion loss for the year to June, is in negotiations to sell the former National Foods headquarters in Mulgrave to an investor.
The 2,600 square metre A-grade office at 30 – 32 Compark Circuit, near the busy intersection of Springvale and Wellington roads, has only recently been re-let to biotechnology tools company Life Technologies which formed last year when Mt Waverley-based Invitrogen Corporation and Scoresby-based Applied Biosystems amalgamated.
ELITE Sports Properties – sports and marketing managers for identities including Nathan Buckley, Eamon Sullivan and Mark Skaife, have relocated from offices within the Rydges Riverwalk complex on the banks of the Yarra River, to an office closer to the MCG, but also in Richmond.
The company is believed to have leased about 750 square metres of A-grade space at 543 Bridge Road, a new office co-developed by private investor and former Giorgio’s restaurant owner, George Saade.
TECHNICIANS, fit-out specialists and suburban leasing agents were burning the midnight-oil in Mulgrave, in the hours following a disastrous fire that almost gutted Silver Top Taxis’ Collingwood headquarters on Tuesday.
Within eight hours of the fire which destroyed Silver Top’s inner-city office and call centre, management was signing a six month lease for a 776 square metre building at Miles Street, an office and call centre until recently occupied by National Hearing.
THE ritzy south-eastern suburb of Armadale is about to lose one of its biggest office tenants, if speculation engineering, science and project delivery giant Sinclair Knight Merz has found a new city headquarters are true.
Well placed industry sources say the Orrong Road based consultancy is formalising plans to lease about 12,000 square metres of CBD office space, with Stockland’s 452 Flinders Street building understood to be the frontrunner.
WESFARMERS owned insurance and financial services provider OAMPS has leased the last chunk of office space, in a distinctive new Becton building opposite the Treasury Gardens on the city’s eastern fringe.
OAMPS will lease 2,568 square metres of high end office space at 289 Wellington Parade South, in East Melbourne, relocating from an office at 176 Wellington Parade nearby.
Engineering consulting firm Irwinconsult has leased 1,868 square metres and will relocate from Southbank.
