Vicinity seals deal on pair of shopping centres
Shopping centre giant Vicinity Centre is nearing the end of its plan to sell off $1.5 billion worth of assets, after offloading major stakes in Brisbane’s The Myer Centre and seaside Victorian hub Mornington Central.
Vicinity will sell a 25% stake in The Myer Centre and a 50% interest in Mornington Central to unlisted funds manager ISPT for a combined $224.6 million, in one of its largest transactions to date.
The deal leaves Vicinity with a 25% share in The Myer Centre, while retaining the other 50% of Mornington Central.
Vicinity has now divested around $1.4 billion of shopping centre assets across Australia, just shy of the $1.5 billion it plans to sell.
Among a procession of 12 deals this year, last month it finalised the sale of Tweed Mall on New South Wales’ north coast to ASX-listed Eleanor Investor Group for $81.25 million.
Vicinity will retain 50% of Mornington Central.
And in May it sold an $841.4 million portfolio of four shopping centres in Queensland and Victoria to Mirvac and American investment firm Blackstone, just one week after selling Queensland mall Indooroopilly Central for $85 million.
Vicinity chief financial officer Michael O’Brien says the group’s asset divestment program is now all but completed.
“We remain on track to complete our asset divestment program of approximately $1.5 billion, having now exchanged contracts on $1.4 billion of assets across 12 shopping centres,” O’Brien says.
The Myer Centre, built in 1988 and acquired by Vicinity in 1999, is a significant six-level asset in the Brisbane CBD, anchored by Myer, Target, Coles and Event Cinemas and featuring more than 145 speciality stores across a gross lettable area of more than 63,000sqm.
Vicinity acquired sub-regional Mornington Central, 45km south of Melbourne’s CBD, in 1999. It in anchored by a Target outlet and Coles and has more than 30 specialty stores.
