TCA showing class with $390m Melbourne swoop
The impending sale of Monash College, at 750 Collins St, Docklands, shows education assets are in hot demand.
Singapore fund manager TrustCapital Advisors is again looking to expand its holdings in Australia and is targeting the purchase of the Monash College complex in Melbourne’s Docklands for about $390m.
The fund manager has been chasing the education asset in a play that would continue its comeback on Australian shores in education after it sold down a major office portfolios in 2017. These included an eastern seaboard portfolio sold for $727.5m and a separate portfolio that was sold for about $500m.
The building has been quietly offered by GPT’s flagship unlisted office trust as it looks to cut back gearing and reposition its holdings ahead of a new manager starting at the company.
Cushman & Wakefield agents Nick Rathgeber and Leigh Melbourne are brokering the deal but declined to comment, as did the parties.
The GPT Wholesale Office Fund has been selling down assets and last year offloaded another Melbourne block. GPT has also been trying to win investor support for a restructure.
Veteran executive Micah Schulz was appointed as fund manager and head of office investment management in July after a stint running Lendlease’s Australian Prime Property Fund Commercial at Lendlease. He starts at GPT in October.
The Monash College complex in Melbourne’s Docklands.
Buying the A-grade office building would expand TCA’s remit in Australian education assets, In 2022, it facilitated acquisition of a purpose-built student accommodation portfolio of seven properties, and it has been looking to place an Asian client into the Docklands asset.
The complex was completed in 2007 and at first housed corporate tenants in the Docklands precinct. The property occupies a 7700sq m site on the corner of Collins Street and Batmans Hill Drive.
After an overhaul by GPT, it now consists of a 10-level campus-style building with super-sized floor plates of about 5660sq m. After a leasing deal struck in 2017, the Monash campus was operating from 2021. The redevelopment resulted in the conversion of the existing 10-storey office building into a contemporary educational facility. It now has collaborative workspaces, a 400-seat auditorium, specialist science rooms, art and design rooms, a student hub and wellness centre.
The building redevelopment included structural modifications to the atrium, making way for 10 new escalators in a “crisscross” format connecting all floors.
The Docklands campus has operated since December 2021, and returned to normal after Covid-related disruptions.
The Monash College Docklands campus hosts international students from countries including China, Japan, Indonesia, Vietnam, Hong Kong and Saudi Arabia.
Education assets have attracted strong bidding. Keppel is trying to expand its reach in the sector with the group circling the Charles Sturt University campus in North Sydney in a $65m deal.
Separately, a unit of Singaporean fund manager Cambridge RE Partners in March struck a deal to purchase a building in Sydney’s Kent Street, occupied by Central Queensland University, in a deal worth about $111.58m.
