Uniting Church sells enormous North Melbourne site for $10m+, ending 170-year ownership
The Uniting Church have sold a significant landholding in North Melbourne for more than $10m.
An enormous North Melbourne property has sold in a more than $10m deal after operating as a Uniting Church worship site for 170 years.
The 4800sq m site occupies two thirds of an inner-city block across three street frontages, including both the heritage 1879-built Mark the Evangelist church – towering up to 46m – and a smaller bluestone church hall built in 1859.
After hitting the commercial property market earlier this year and attracting interest from more than 200 buyers, the 579-599 Queensberry St and 51-61 Curzon St addresses recently sold to an investor for an undisclosed sum understood to be above $10m.
RELATED: Uniting Church selling North Melbourne church site in expected $10m sale
Fitzroy house price record: Incredible church conversion wowing buyers
JLL capital markets director Jesse Radisich declined to comment on the sale price but said a landbanker who planned to hold the property long term and lease some of its vacant buildings placed the successful offer.
“The campaign generated 217 interested parties, and despite some of the complexities and challenges of the site from a heritage and environmental perspective, a very pleasing sale outcome and settlement arrangement for our client was achieved,” Mr Radisich said.
“This transaction demonstrates that robust demand is in the market for significant landholdings
with income and upside potential, and many active purchasers are not impacted or concerned by uncertainty around interest rates”.
The church has operated as a site of worship for 170 years.
Inside the historic church.
He added that the scale of the offering, the “premium” location and the extensive existing buildings on site were all factors contributing to the significant interest from buyers.
Tenancies across the North Melbourne site currently bring in a total of about $361,320 a year.
In addition to the two churches, the property also includes an eight-bedroom manse once home to the Uniting Church minister, several terraced homes, a handful of units, a commercial building facing Curzon St, and a few character buildings.
However, the sale will now force the local Mark the Evangelist congregation that still attends services at the main church to find a new place of worship.
It comes after a Uniting Church spokesman explained at the time of the listing that they had been planning to merge with another congregation for “some time” as the property’s maintenance costs no longer fit the faith group’s “missional goals”.
The local Mark the Evangelist congregation plans to merge with another congregation.
The property also comes with a commercial building facing Curzon St.
“Their hope is that the proceeds of the sale will fund that missional work for many decade into the future,” the spokesman said.
“It would be our desire that a new owner is able to respectfully develop the site to reflect its history and allow rejuvenation of the buildings and introduction of contemporary uses to the site through a sensitive adaptive reutilisation.”
Uniting Church director of property services Peter Thomas said both the church and the congregation were pleased with the recent sale.
Sign up to the Herald Sun Weekly Real Estate Update. Click here to get the latest Victorian property market news delivered direct to your inbox.
MORE: Kim Kardashian’s spaceship-shaped ‘dream home’ halted
PropTrack: Melbourne rents rising faster than any other capital, could get worse
Brunswick West ‘typical nonna’s house’ sells for first time in 62 years, scores $150k windfall
emily.holgate@news.com.au
