Buyers banking on prime position in Highton

Commonwealth Bank is selling its former branch at 73 Barrabool Rd, Highton.

Local real estate agents could be among the biggest contenders as the Commonwealth Bank sells off its former Highton branch.

It’s not a big retail property per se, but with 37 metres of street frontage at the busy Highton Village shopping centre, potential buyers are clearly seeing it as prime real estate.

Colliers Geelong agent Andrew Lewis said he’s already deflected several offers in the early days of the campaign, which is being jointly handled with Fitzroys.

Mr Lewis said the property at 73 Barrabool Rd will go to auction on October 27.

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But with strong interest so early in the campaign, he’s confident the price guide of above $1.5 million will be eclipsed come auction day.

Retail properties becoming available for sale publicly are a rarity for the Highton Village shopping centre.

Commonwealth Bank is selling its former branch at 73 Barrabool Rd, Highton.

“It’s been on the market less than a week and we’ve had over 20 inquiries on it and we’ve had some very solid offers,” Mr Lewis said.

“However it’s got to go to auction, just for the due process of the bank so all their customers, all their shareholders get an opportunity to buy it at the auction.

“We’ve had a quote range of in excess of $1.5 million but we’re very confident it’s going to go in excess of that just by the amount of interest we’ve had.

“There is very little investment quality stock out there (in Highton) and this is on an enormous big frontage of 30m in that very popular strip.”

Commonwealth Bank is selling its former branch at 73 Barrabool Rd, Highton.

Mr Lewis said agents couldn’t identify another sale in the strip over the past five years.

The last property to sell publicly was the anchor Woolworths supermarket freehold in 2017.

“If you compare to that Pakington St, you can pretty week buy something in Pakington St most days,” he said.

“If you look at the number of real estate agents that are in there, and a lot of them are in rented premises, there has been strong interest from the local agents in buying it for their own offices. The big frontages it suits them too.”
But he said investors could also snap up the multi-level solid brick retail building of 206sq m on a 211sq m Commercial 1 zoned land.

Highton Village is a key shopping centre in Geelong’s southern suburbs.

Neighbours in the thriving local shopping centre include major retailers such as Woolworths, Bakers Delight, Amcal, Bendigo Bank and Cellarbrations.

Commonwealth Bank closed its branch during the first pandemic lockdown in 2020, locking in its departure from Barrabool Rd in July when it officially closed for good, citing a decline in over the counter transactions in the past five years.

CommBank’s departure from leaves the Bendigo as the only bank maintaining a presence at Highton Village, while centre’s licensed post office can handle withdrawals, deposits and bill payments through Bank@Post.