Bruce Solomon’s Solotel has achieved its second big-ticket sale and lease-back, settling on a bid of $60 million for the land holding of its Albion Hotel in Parramatta.
The generous 3,135 m² block on the corner of George and Harris Streets overlooks the Parramatta River and Queen’s Wharf Reserve, and is zoned B4 mixed use.
An unnamed Shanghai-based developer paid the whopping sum for the right to develop the prime block, while Solotel will remain owning and operating the pub business, itself worth in the region of $40 million.
Solotel confirmed to PubTIC it will be business as usual for at least the next two years where “nothing changes” with the current operation, while plans are submitted and eventually enacted.
The highly competitive EOI sale, through Ray White Hotels and Commercial divisions, and local property agents Khoury & Partners, has now exchanged and is unconditional of any successful approval process for development.
Sources say Dyldam, which last year paid $50 million for the Bull & Bush in Baulkham Hills, and already owns the huge former Cumberland Press warehouse site next door, was one of the competitive bidders.
Central Parramatta reportedly already has somewhere near 7,000 apartments under construction or in planning, and the Albion site already has a planning proposal submitted for a 35-storey apartment complex with hundreds more riverside residences, atop a new three-level Albion Hotel.
Ray White’s Asia-Pacific director Andrew Jolliffe was unable to comment on the sale, but in prospectus documents the agents described it as a “remarkable Parramatta CBD development opportunity” and noted the key infrastructure projects taking place in the area – both in response to and driving the development wave.
Over coming years, Parramatta will enjoy the introduction of light rail, the $2 billion Parramatta Square project, the ‘Parramatta City River Strategy’ upgrading the ferry service, and major expansion of the UWS Parramatta campus.
In 2014, Solotel sold the freehold of its Double Bay powerhouse, the Golden Sheaf for circa $40 million to a local investor, at a tight yield of around six per cent.
Solomon has held the Albion Hotel site for 30 years. He is reported to be, understandably “really pleased with the result”.
