Cromwell leads race for $530m Brisbane tower
Brisbane’s central business district office market is again luring local groups, with Cromwell heading the race to acquire a major George Street office tower for about $530 million.
The group is in talks to buy the landmark 400 George St from US private equity and property giant Blackstone and German group HSBC Trinkaus, after a fiercely contested sales campaign.
The sale of the tower via Luke Billiau and Seb Turnbull of JLL and Bruce Baker and Flint Davidson of CBRE is poised to become the city’s largest office deal this year and Cromwell’s equity raising could help seal it after it edged out Suntec REIT.
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The 34-storey building was pitched as a play on the recovering Queensland office market and comes amid a series of fresh transactions.
The building in the North Quarter precinct is well placed to capitalise on the city’s $12.7 billion worth of infrastructure projects.
The building, opened in 2009, sports state-of-the-art design featuring a glass facade, 1412sq m floorplates and a Green Star Rating of five. It has four levels of basement parking for 221 vehicles, three ground-floor retail tenancies and spans 43,493sqm of office and retail.
It has a 4.9-year weighted average lease expiry and houses private sector, regulators and legal groups.
The A-grade building was developed by Leighton Properties and Grosvenor in 2009.
Leighton sold its half-interest to Trinkaus in 2007 for $210m and Grosvenor sold its half-stake in 2013 for $178 million to South Australia’s MAC.
Blackstone picked up its half-interest when it bought the $500m-plus MAC portfolio, paying about $210 million.
This article originally appeared on www.theaustralian.com.au/property.
