A mix of New Zealand and Singaporean investors has bought five Kiwi retail properties worth close to $100 million.
The deals, all brokered by Bayleys Commercial agents, show that says while some parts of the retail property market have suffered as a result of Covid-19, other subsectors are continuing to attract a good level of investor enquiry.
Two of the properties were Auckland suburban shopping centres that had Countdown supermarket as the anchor tenant, Meadowlands Shopping Plaza in Sommerville and Kelston Mall in Glen Eden.
Start your property search
Kelston Mall was sold on behalf of PMG Funds for $43.4 million at a 5.86 percent yield by Bayleys' national director of commercial, Ryan Johnson, and Bayleys agents Sunil Bhana, Cameron Melhuish and James Hill.
The buyer was a private investor who had attended a Bayleys Knight Frank Investment New Zealand seminar in Singapore.
Meadowlands Shopping Plaza was bought by a private New Zealand investor for $23.05 million at a 5.72 percent yield. Johnson, Melhuish and fellow Bayleys agent James Chan brokered the deal.
Johnson told OneRoof that demand would be high for retail properties with strong tenants such as grocery businesses, supermarkets and pharmacies.
“Buyers are distinguishing between discretionary and non-discretionary retail business tenancies. Kelston Mall has a good mix of the latter with other major tenants in addition to Countdown including a pharmacy and medical centre, a childcare centre and Mobil service station. It also has a McDonald’s restaurant.”
The Meadowlands Shopping Plaza sale settled this month. Melhuish said the property had a 96.85 percent occupancy and a 5.2 year WALE, with its current lease to Countdown running until 2026.
The property also has Local Centre zoning, which provides future development options, allowing for buildings up to four storeys with residential on upper floors.
The property attracted over 100 enquires from domestic and offshore parties, with six expressions of interest submitted.
Johnson said the Singaporean purchaser of the Kelston Mall was the under bidder on Meadowlands. “They were still keen to secure a similar type of property within 30km of Auckland’s CBD. We provided several other options but Kelston was the one that best met their requirements and this sale was negotiated in an off-market transaction.”
Also selling to a Singapore based investor for $13.2 million at a 6.5 percent yield were two retail offerings in the Auckland CBD’s Wynyard Quarter developed and owned by Willis Bond & Co.
Both were multi-tenanted, unit titled commercial premises on the ground floor of new luxury apartment buildings in the mixed use waterfront precinct.
Johnson, who brokered the deal with Chris Beasleigh, Bayleys’ national director for retail sales and leasing, said: “The buyer was an existing contact on Bayleys’ South East Asian client database who was attracted by the quality of development in the Wynyard Quarter and who sees it becoming an increasingly sought after location as the CBD continues to expand along the western waterfront area."
The premises comprises 10 commercial units totalling 773sqm in the cedar-clad Pavilions residential complex with frontage to Daldy and Pakenham streets, fully leased to a mix of food and beverage and service businesses, and five retail and hospitality units totalling 493sqm in a seven-level apartment building with 113 luxury residences at 132 Halsey Street.
Another Countdown-anchored property, in Fraser Cove shopping centre in Tauranga, sold for $20 million to Siverfin Capital at a 6.2 percent yield. The deal was brokered by Bayleys agents Peter Gorton, Mike Houlker and Mark Walton and was settled last month.
Silverfin’s syndication of the property encompassing 299 interests of $50,000 has been fully subscribed.
