Grocon's Bruno Grollo gives up Phillip Island estate Woolamai House

The historic 1860s era home is now on just 1.76 hectares of the island’s coast overlooking Cape Woolamai and Bass Strait.

Mr Grollo’s son Adam Grollo told Capital Gain: “The family has grown up and headed off in different directions. The property isn’t getting the use that it used to have.”

“We used to go there when we were a lot younger,” Mr Grollo said.

A lot has changed for the Grollos since then. The family fortune was split in 2012, with brother Daniel Grollo taking control of the risky Grocon development and construction business while Bruno and the rest of the family retained ownership of more passive assets.

Grocon, amid a bruising legal battle with Dexus over a $28 million Brisbane leasing deal, is reportedly making a $135 million play for Nick Theodossi’s 1.5 hectare Prestige Cars site in North Melbourne in a joint venture with Singapore Investment Corp.

The Grollo’s seven-bedroom Italianate mansion in Phillip Island, built by colonial hotelier Captain John Blake Cleeland, has a recently had an award-winning extension added – in concrete, naturally – designed by Robert Simeoni.

Captain Cleeland owned the 1875 Melbourne Cup winning horse Woolamai who was trained on the island.

The property is being sold by an expressions of interest campaign run by John Castran and Alex Scott closing in early February. The property is expected to fetch more than $3.5 million.

Hengyi lease

The business of leasing out the retail space at Hengyi’s Swanston Central project goes on, despite the tax stoush engulfing the developer.

Asian grocer chain Mr Daddy is leasing a 557-square-metres shop in the 2000-square-metres of retail space in the heritage CUB building.

CBRE agents Zelman Ainsworth and Jason Orenbuch handled the 10 year leasing deal, struck at $550,000 a year with no landlord works.

“There were a number of Asian supermarkets competing for the prime space which is in a building with significant heritage,” Mr Ainsworth said.

Negotiations over the remaining 1500-square-metres of retail space were expected to be completed this week.

At the end of October, the Australian Tax Office froze more than $100 million in personal assets belonging to Hengyi owner Min Wang over a $103.13 million tax bill for the 2015-16 financial year.

According to documents on the Federal Court website, the freezing order has been extended until February 3, 2020.

Hengyi has also put up for sale a 1920s era office building 2-6 Southampton Crescent in Abbotsford which should fetch more than $20 million. That will help foot the bill.

Seven Seeds

A Sydney-based developer has paid $16 million for three neighbouring properties – including Seven Seeds Coffee Roasters – at 114-120 Berkeley Street, Carlton.

Title deeds show Xiaoling Zha’s W&Z Worldwide group recently settled on the 660 sq m site in the heart of the university precinct.

The buyer is understood to be planning to build and run its own student housing project on the Capital City-zoned site.

There is some income coming in until the project gets up. Seven Seeds has a five year lease running until November 2023 and pays $107,380 a year in rent.

CVA agent Anthony Carbone negotiated the off-market deal, one of the last on his books as he prepares to leave the agency. The deal represented a total land rate of $24,242 a square metre.

The site is just a couple of streets away from two of the biggest Carlton deals yet to be done this year – the Rydges on Swanston at 701 Swanston Street and the Red Cross office on the corner of Bouverie and Pelham streets.

Both $40 million-plus properties face the newly refurbished Lincoln Square, which is both a blessing and a curse for developers.

The City of Melbourne’s proposed but not yet gazetted C278 amendment is designed to stop the overshadowing of parks which are becoming ever more important public space as the proportion of the city’s population living in towers soars.

But it effectively reduces any new building’s height to eight-to-nine levels from the previous 14 storeys. Not that it stops permits already in place. Next door to the Rydges at 18-20 Lincoln Square North, a 14-storey tower is being marketed.

And on the other side of the square, Paul Little’s $110 million University of Melbourne joint student accommodation venture, Little Hall, is well under way.

CBRE and Colliers International are understood to be working on the second round shortlist for the Red Cross site in hand with offers expected to come in at around the high $40 million mark.

Meanwhile, the Rydges site owner is still fielding enquiries through Jones Real Estate and Colliers International who declined to comment.

Heidelberg hopes

Among the flurry of last minute deals wrapping up before the end of the year is a strip of double-storey offices at 108-120 Mount Street, opposite Heidelberg Station.

A local buyer is understood to have spent $11.4 million on the 2376-square-metre site. The deal has settled but the buyer is shrouded in secrecy, having made the purchase through Equity Trustees.

Colliers International agent Hamish Burgess, Joe Kairouz and Jun Lai negotiated the private sale for HB Project, a subsidiary of China-based developer Tianjin Hubam Investment Company. HB Project paid $10 million in 2015.

The property comes with a permit for an eight level 120-unit project, with five shops, a restaurant and an office.

It’s around the corner from the Burgundy Street shopping strip and the Austin Hospital complex.

Temperance Cafe

A local investor has put down a sober $2.164 million on the Temperance Cafe at 188 Little Collins Street.

The lunchtime auction attracted a good crowd but the final price didn’t quite make it to the $2.48 million spent on it in 2014.

Fitzroys agents Terence Yeh and Alex Shum acted for the private Malaysian-based vendors – Johnny Ooi and Lit Huey Tee, according to the title.

The 38-square-metre cafe is at the foot of Shocko House, a four-storey heritage building converted into apartments in 1998.