Ned Kelly has charged into the Amble Inn, bolstering the gang with a massive coastal lot at Corindi Beach, near Coffs Harbour.
The Amble Inn was built by the family operators in 1985, on a huge 1.6-Ha (16,000sqm) property around 30 minutes’ north of Coffs Harbour. It is the last pub heading north for 50 kilometres.
It has been sold now for the first time in its history, for $12 million.
Originally marketed as the entire site, Kelly approached the owners about sale of the Hotel without the surplus land, which has since been sold in one package to a Sydney developer.
Holding its own on a block around 4,000sqm, Kelly plans to capitalise on its proximity to the beach and wrap the pub in cabins and accommodation. Close to Queensland, with staggered holiday starting dates, local caravan parks are reportedly booked solid for a good percentage of the year.
“There’s a real opportunity to do accommodation – and we’re going to go up a level, for a function centre with sweeping ocean views,” says Kelly.
The bush roaming hotelier adds to his collection of eight pubs, recently coming to include the Tattersalls Hotel Casino and just last month Scone’s Belmore Hotel.
Rodney ‘Ned’ Kelly is principal of Kelly & Co Hotels, which counts Corey Dunn as an investor at the group’s thumping Criterion Hotel Weston, and now at Corindi Beach.
Dunn sold his Maroubra cleaning empire to private equity, and seeing the success in Weston was eager to put their accumulated equity to better use, making the Amble Inn a real “destination pub”.
The deal was brokered by JLL Hotels’ Ben McDonald and Kate MacDonald, as a steady stream of Sydney operators find their way into virtually any NSW town with population greater than around 15 thousand residents.
“There’s not a dual market and simply bush or city publicans anymore,” insists Kelly.
“I get annoyed when valuers and banks apply a rural LVR when you’re in an auction room competing with three metro publicans. Not my bank,” he adds. “My bank’s great.
“Everyone wants a pub on the coast, but there’s a serious appetite now for large-format coastal hotels. They’re almost bulletproof.
“I really mean it when I say some great operators have picked up others in the region. We’re the last house on the street.”
