Pakington St shops set record strip price
A record price has been set for commercial property in Newtown’s Pakington St shopping strip.
A 775sqm retail property at 313 Pakington St, Newtown, sold for $2.4 million after auction on Friday.
The property was passed in at auction for $2.25 million, selling immediately after to a local investor.
Darcy Jarman agent Simon Jarman and Buxton, Newtown director Ben Riddle were conjunctional agents on the campaign.
Jarman says it will be a long-term investment for the buyer.
It comes with long-term leases to two longstanding tenants, Steampocket Pizzeria and Cafe and Pamper Medical Skin Clinic.
The Steampocket cafe occupies part of the site.
“They will sit on it. Both tenants are longstanding at the property and nothing in the short term will change,” Jarman says.
He says the sale represents a circa 4.5% yield, based on the $110,000 annual rent earned on the property.
It has three street frontages, including the corner of Pakington St and Huntingdon St.
It has topped a clutch of sales in recent years which have highlighted the river end shopping strip’s strong commercial property sector.
The quality of the tenants and the location drove competition for nearby 322 Pakington St, a 411sq m property home to Newtown’s pharmacy and a fashion boutique, when Darcy Jarman auctioned it in October.
The prime corner site is part of premium retail strip.
A Geelong investor paid a record price to secure the site ahead of four other bidders.
In 2018, the nearby site of the suburb’s post office sold for $930,000 at auction, eclipsing price hopes by $300,000.
Jarman says strong results in the commercial property sector follow from the rise in the city’s residential property market.
“Historically, the residential growth of Geelong has always come before the commercial growth,” Jarman says.
“With the exceptional growth, it’s now starting to flow on to the commercial market with many investors outside Geelong certainly looking at Geelong as a place to invest, now even more than ever,” he says.
Riddle says prior to the auction that the rare opportunity to secure almost 800sq m that provided future development opportunity would drive the demand in the property.
This article from the Geelong Advertiser originally appeared as “Newtown retail site sets Pakington St record in post-auction sale”.
