Renown doctor sells purpose-built Woolies
Sports doctor, researcher and author, amongst other things, Peter Brukner, has turned a profit selling a regional Victorian shopping centre.
The nine year old Woolworths anchored Bayview Central Curlewis on 1.3 hectares at 90 Centennial Boulevard – 19 kilometres east of Geelong’s CBD – collected $20.2 million from a first time China based investor following an off-market campaign.
Mr Brukner paid Woolworths’ development arm, Fabcot, $17.1m – a 6.7 per cent yield – in April, 2019, settling that September.
Also with seven specialty shops and a kiosk, it contains 4343 square metres; the weighted average lease expiry is speculated to be more than six years.
In a growth corridor, the catchment is expected to grow to about 180,000 by 2031.
Fabcot paid $3.85m in 2011 for the block which made way for the complex.
Stonebridge’s Justin Dowers and Kevin Tong – who sold the asset to Mr Brukner – marketed it for him.
The respected doctor, also a La Trobe University professor, holds other modern east coast supermarket-anchored retail investments (story continues below).
Elsewhere in the Bellarine region, at Leopold, near Curlewis, Harvey Norman in 2022 acquired a retail development site, outlaying $11m.
Fabcot asset trades again
The Curlewis deal comes a fortnight since we reported Fabcot bought an ex-Bunnings near Newcastle to repurpose as a Woolworths-backed mall.
Interestingly, that property contains a c13,000 sqm warehouse, more than twice the size of malls the group recently built on vacant blocks.
In July meanwhile, members of the Hirsch family, which co-found United Petroleum, sold a Woolworths backed mall at Wendouree, Ballarat.
Like Mr Brukner, that seller bought the property from Woolworths, but in 1990.
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