CBD Commercial Property News

The commitment of Chinese conglomerate Dalian Wanda to its $2 billion projects in Sydney and Surfers Paradise is again in doubt, with the company offering to bundle up and sell its international apartment and hotel projects in a $6.6 billion mega-deal.

Chinese investors are targeting more towers in the heart of Sydney, with Hong Kong groups setting a cracking pace and mainland groups also in the mix, striking two property deals with a combined value of about $450 million.

High-end retailers are postponing their foray into Brisbane until the luxury Queen’s Wharf project is completed in the next decade. 

Sydney’s Pitt St Mall remains one of the world’s most expensive retail strips on which to lease a shop.

Cashed-up Chinese groups are pushing deeper into Sydney’s suburban offices and apartments with sites worth about $200 million changing hands, defying concerns about a year-on-year slump in Chinese outbound property investment in the third quarter.

Australia’s top banks are shifting their headquarters into glittering new skyscrapers along the eastern seaboard, setting commercial property markets alight at a time when they are also dramatically overhauling their workforces.

The $US20 billion ($26 billion) global co-working space operator WeWork sees “massive” opportunities for expansion locally after opening its first Melbourne office and is actively looking for more sites.

Hong Kong-based K Wah has joined the array of Asian buyers that have snapped up Sydney towers and has just struck a deal to buy a building from funds giant TH Real Estate for about $192 million. 

It is shaping up as the year of the mega deal for top shopping centres, after mall landlord Vicinity Centres and Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund GIC agreed to swap assets worth a combined $1.1 billion.