Futuro consolidates Bourke Street tower in separate deals
Sydney-based Futuro Capital has acquired the historic Tivoli Arcade, retail shops and carpark on Bourke Street in Melbourne from their long-time owner, the Venton International, in a $73 million deal.
The acquisition gives Futuro control over the entire building at 235-251 Bourke Street, after last year striking an agreement to buy a 14-storey section of the tower from RMIT University for $133 million.
The Sydney platform was backed by investment partners Baring Private Equity Asia and Singapore-listed SLB Developments.
Futuro is planning a major refurbishment of the property, with the arcade to be reworked as a high-end retail destination.
“We are delighted to have now secured the freehold strata building, which has significant potential for further development and rental reversion, with a long-term lease in place with RMIT,” Futuro director Ben Hopkins said.
“Bourke Street is one of Melbourne’s major thoroughfares and the property has 17 levels of high-quality commercial offices with floor plates averaging 1670 square metres, while the arcade has significant potential value accretion following a total refurbishment.”
The Tivoli Arcade, retail shops and carpark comprise around 6000sq m, in addition to the 23,000sq m of office space acquired as part of the RMIT deal last year. The 30,000sq m building stands on around 3000sq m of land, just a short walk from Bourke Street mall.
Futuro’s purchase of the arcade and carpark was brokered through Colliers International’s Oliver Hay and TT Global’s Tony Tai.
The sale of the RMIT strata stake last year was handled by CBRE’s Kiran Pillai, Scott McGlone, Mark Coster and Stuart McCann together with Gross Waddell’s Andrew Waddell, Danny Clark, Michael Gross and Raoul Salter.
The Bourke Street consolidation comes amid signs Melbourne’s commercial property market is beginning to thaw after last year’s long second lockdown.
In recent deals, the Collins Street head office of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, sold for more than $40 million, while residential developer Burbank sold its headquarters of almost two decades, a historic five-storey building at 100 Franklin Street, for nearly $30 million.
The Rich Lister Tarascio family, has shortlisted bidders for its tower at 63 Exhibition Street.
Appetite for trophy retail property will soon be tested as well, with a controlling stake in one of Melbourne’s best-known retail destinations, the Myer Melbourne store in the heart of the Bourke Street mall, also set to hit the market.
