Novotel hotel and luxury mall St Collins Lane for sale
Melbourne’s 4.5-star Novotel hotel and reborn retail precinct St Collins Lane are on the market with a whopping $500 million price tag.
LaSalle Investment Management has put the hotel and St Collins Lane luxury mixed-use retail zone below up for sale as a pair or individually, just weeks ahead of the retail mall’s reopening after a $30 million refurbishment.
The CBD shopping precinct was formerly known as Australia on Collins, but has been rebranded and will soon welcome a host of new international retailers when it opens next month.
The Novotel has 380 guest rooms, conference facilities, a restaurant and bar at its 270 Collins St address.
JLL’s Craig Collins and Simon Rooney have been appointed to sell the properties, with Collins saying the Novotel is set to put Melbourne’s hotels back on investors’ radars.
We have seen exceptionally strong demand from institutional investors for prime CBD assets, evident in recent transactions
“Novotel Melbourne on Collins is one of Melbourne’s leading hotels benefiting from proximity to key demand drivers,” he says.
“It has an established trading history and the potential to reposition the asset, taking the opportunity to leverage its phenomenal core fundamentals. After strong focus on Sydney hotel investment we are seeing several investors move their attention to Melbourne, where the city’s strong events offering, cultural experience and strong financial hub has positioned it on the world stage.”
Rooney says interest remains high in CBD properties, as evidenced by ISPT’s $116 million purchase of 206 Bourke St in December. ISPT also grabbed Sydney’s World Square Shopping Centre and car park from Brookfield for $285 million in December.
“We have seen exceptionally strong demand from institutional investors for prime CBD assets, evident in recent transactions, and we expect St Collins Lane will attract high levels of interest from a broad range of domestic and offshore core buyers,” he says.
The two properties will be sold via expressions of interest, which close on June 2.
