Inner Sydney super site tipped to sell for more than $300m
An industrial site in Sydney’s inner west that could yield more than 1000 apartments and a shopping precinct once rezoned is expected to sell for more than $300 million after being listed for sale by two prominent local families.
The 3.12 hectare Five Dock property at 129 – 153 Parramatta Road and 53-75 Queens Road – about 11 kilometres west of the Sydney city centre – has already attracted the attention of major build-to-rent and build-to-sell developers both locally based and offshore.
To be marketed as Kings Bay Village, the site has been amalgamated over more than 20 years by the Dodaro and Drivas families, headed respectively by commercial lawyer and Raine & Horne franchisee Robert Dodaro and developers George and Dimitri Drivas.
It is home to more than 22,000 square metres of leased industrial buildings but is expected to be rezoned for mixed-use purposes this year as part of a proposal led by the City of Canada Bay Council aimed at transforming a portion of the Parramatta Road corridor running through Five Dock into more community-friendly infrastructure.
Once rezoned, the site could support more than 90,000 square metres of gross floor area, including multiple residential towers as high as 20 storeys.
With the median apartment price in Five Dock about $1 million, a future development could yield well over $1 billion of residential and retail end value in an area facing an undersupply of apartment stock, according to selling agents James Cowan, Matthew Meynell and Trent Gallagher from Colliers.
“The site is difficult to price given the rarity of the offering. However, interest before the launch of the official sales campaign has been north of $300 million from both build-to-rent and build-to-sell groups,” Mr Cowan said.
Its prime inner-city location, a 10-minute walk from both the Burwood North and Five Dock Metro Stations that are to be built as part of Sydney Metro West, is expected to draw in competing bids from major developers.
The Australian Financial Review understands that those showing interest in the site include global BTR specialists Greystar and Sentinel as well as the likes of Sydney-based developers Meriton, JQZ and Deicorp.
“Our recent experience in marketing significant, generational, assets such as Kings Bay Village has demonstrated the vast depth of capital seeking bulk and scale,” said Mr Gallagher.
A 2.86ha residential development site at 130 Joynton Avenue in Zetland in the inner south being marketed by Colliers and Knight Frank was being chased by “significant domestic and international” developers, he said.
“South Sydney and the inner west are land-constrained markets with very little scalable site left in these precincts which is creating high demand for the few remaining sites such as Five Dock as developers know these types of opportunities are irreplaceable,” Mr Gallagher said.
Mr Meynell agreed.
“We have seen a considerable uptick in enquiry from large offshore developers and institutional developers working on the thematic that the combination of inbound skilled migration overlaid by the considerable undersupply of stock by 2024 will drive pricing escalations,” he said.
