Singapore family buys Perth prefab hotel for discounted $26m
Singapore’s wealthy Jaleel family has bought its third Australian hotel in just 12 months, acquiring the 120-room Peppers Kings Square in the Perth city centre for just over $26 million.
Australia’s tallest prefabricated hotel when it was completed by modular specialist Hickory in November 2016, the 17-storey property was last up for sale in 2017, when price expectations ranged as high as $30 million.
The acquisition by the Jaleel family’s High Street Holdings (HSH) adds to its $75 million purchase of the former Rydges North Sydney (rebranded as The Miller Hotel) from ASX-listed Event Hospitality & Entertainment at the end of May, and the purchase of the Richmont Hotel in Brisbane’s Fortitude Valley last year (since rebranded as the Kennigo Hotel Brisbane).
The Peppers Hotel will be rebranded as Rydges King Square, marking the return of Event’s corporate-focused brand into the Perth market. Event also operates HSH’s two other Australian hotels under its Independent Collection brand.
HSH partner Daniel Yip called the acquisition of the Perth hotel a “great value-add opportunity in one of the country’s hottest economies”.
“It presents multiple upside opportunities, including a repositioning, the reconfiguration of the hotel’s ground level and meeting spaces, as well as the potential to create a multipurpose venue on the rooftop,” Mr Yip said.
The innovative hotel was developed by former Royal Australia Air Force fighter pilot Christian Boucousis’ Mode Developments, and offered for sale by interests associated with Sydney developer John Molyneaux and his family.
‘Well-placed to benefit’
It opened in November 2016 after taking just 11 weeks to erect the modular components. The total project timeframe was 12 months, half the amount of time it would have taken using traditional building methods.
Located directly opposite Perth Arena at 621 Wellington Street, the hotel consists of 120 guest rooms, a ground level restaurant, meeting facilities and gym.
CBRE’s head of capital markets in WA, Aaron Desange acted on behalf of the purchaser HSH.
“Both corporate and leisure travel is recovering throughout the Asia-Pacific region, and Perth hotels remain exceptionally well-placed to benefit from this,” Mr Desange said.
“Perth CBD revPAR (revenue per available room) continues to improve and CBRE Hotels forecast this growth will climb further into 2023.”
Perth hotels averaged 68 per cent occupancy rates in June, up from 58 per cent a year ago, according to figures from analysts STR. The average daily rate was $193 up from $175.
“The West Australian resources sector has multiple large-scale construction projects about to commence which will have a positive downstream impact on the rest of the economy and particularly the lodging market,” Mr Desange said.
