This was published 7 years ago
Draculas family sells Pacific House in Melbourne as private investors offload
By Simon Johanson
Melbourne's private investors are offloading assets to take advantage of the strong commercial sector, which is being spurred by low interest rates and the falling Australian dollar.
An unlisted property trust associated with Friendly Group owner Ron Lazarovits and Nufarm founder Max Fremder has put a 10-level office tower at 438 Elizabeth Street on the market, with price expectations of about $80 million.
A 10-level office building at 438 Elizabeth Street in Melbourne is for sale.
Colliers International and Teska Carson have been appointed to handle the sale of the office, built in 1990, which covers a sizeable area in Melbourne's student quarter and has a net lettable area of nearly 14,000 square metres, returning income of about $4.5 million a year.
The building's main tenant is RMIT University.
Colliers city sales director Daniel Wolman said Melbourne's commercial market was still being underpinned by heightened interest from offshore investors.
"The market's still extremely strong," he said.
Last week another private investor sold a vacant office in Raglan Street, South Melbourne, at auction for $9.125 million, equivalent to a land rate of $10,928 per square metre.
CBRE's Ed Wright, who handled the deal in conjunction with Colliers' Andrew Ryan, said the vacant building prompted interest from investors and developers.
The property was purchased by a private investor.
The family behind the successful Draculas cabaret restaurants chain have also been recycling their property portfolio, selling a city building in Lonsdale Street called Pacific House.
The five-storey Edwardian brick building is believed to have changed hands for more than $10 million, three years after the Newman family purchased it for $7.15 million at auction.
The building was owned by four members of the entertainment family, who run two bloodthirsty cabaret venues in Melbourne and the Gold Coast, and a walk-through haunted house in Surfers Paradise.
Melbourne's Draculas – a mock-Gothic castle festooned with purple neon, stained glass and gargoyles – is on the corner of Cardigan and Victoria streets in Carlton.
Pacific House was also sold with vacant possession, but has plans lodged last year with the city council that allow an upgrade of the facades and an additional two-storey extension.
The building sits opposite the Melbourne Emporium shopping centre and a few doors east of Melbourne Central at 268-270 Lonsdale Street, a northern pocket of the city that has recently seen rapid growth in retail and apartment building activity.
Mulcahy & Co and CBRE agencies handled the sale. Neither would comment on the deal.