Sydney rich-lister sells prized Canberra vineyard

Denny stepped in to take over the mortgage on the Pialligo Estate, about 7.5 kilometres from Canberra’s CBD, last year. The high-end, sustainably operated hospitality and agricultural property spans 12.6 hectares and includes a glasshouse, pavilion dining, market grill and alfresco bar.

Pialligo is being sold as a mortgagee in possession by CRC1, a company owned by Denny. A price guide is tricky, given the mortgage. Similar sites have ranged between $17 million to $24 million.

Savills’s national director Nick Lower and state director Tim Grosmann, along with LJ Hooker Commercial Canberra principal Greg Lyons are handling the sale.

Grove grabbed

Prominent Melbourne-based fund managers Fawkner Property have swooped on the Figtree Grove shopping centre, a premier sub-regional asset in Wollongong, in a $192 million deal.

Despite the cost-of-living crisis hitting retailers, shopping centres with solid food and supermarket anchors are still being keenly sought by investors.

Figtree Grove generates annual sales around $220 million and is anchored by Coles, Woolworths and Kmart, along with 65 specialty stores. The deal, brokered on behalf of MA Financial and Paragon REIT by JLL’s Nick Willis and Sam Hatcher, boosts Fawkner’s portfolio which, over the past 18 months, has grown by more than $1.5 billion.

The fund manager previously landed the Willows shopping centre in Nowra and Cairns Central which they acquired just over a year ago from Lendlease for $390 million.

Pub deals

The new year has kicked off with a flurry of deals in the pub world.

It follows a busy end to last year during which investor Sam Arnaout’s Iris Capital paid a reported $180 million to MA Financial’s Redcape Group for its Cabramatta Hotel in Sydney’s Cabramatta and El Cortez in Canley Heights.

Agents, HTL Property’s Dan Dragicevich and Andrew Jolliffe, told Capital Gain the twin deals also represent the highest price paid for pubs in 2024, taking the consolidated value of hotel sales in metro Sydney to $1 billion.

HTL also recently negotiated the sale of Newcastle icon Finnegan’s Hotel. The purchasers are veteran publicans Cath Antaw and Stewart Smith, the couple who operate the Great Northern in Teralba. Also in Sydney’s north-west growth corridor, the Tumbridge family sold the Railway Hotel in Windsor after 27 years through HTL and Peter Chidgey to a private buyer.

In the city, the Edinburgh Castle Hotel on the corner of Pitt and Bathurst streets, was bought by John Azar’s Good Beer Company. It will be added to the group’s pub portfolio.

JLL’s Ben McDonald, Kate MacDonald and James Aroney advised on the sale, which reflects a 3.2 per cent cap rate on the passing income at a reported price around $30 million.

Data deal

In a major coup, Lendlease has signed up data network provider NBN Co as a tenant for its $1.2 billion Victoria Cross Tower in North Sydney. It sits atop the new metro station of the same name.

NBN will occupy six floors or 9000 square metres across levels 6 to 11 when it relocates in mid-2026. The group will not have to travel far as they have a lease signed in 2010 in Dexus-owned 100 Mount Street nearby.

Like many companies, NBN Co has been reducing space (down from 13,000 square metres across 11 floors) as flexible work dictates staff commutes to the office. It joins infrastructure services provider Ventia in the Mount Street building.