Toowoomba’s famous Shamrock Hotel has been sold by Wayne and Seona Lee to former AHA Vice-President Pat Gurr, bringing news of a major transformation.
Located on the edge of the Toowoomba CBD for more than 130 years, the large-format Shamrock resides on a 3,253sqm block, offering four bars, restaurant dining, a function space and conference room, TAB gaming room with 39 gaming machines, 35 motel-style accommodation rooms, an upstairs manager’s quarters and valuable off-street parking.
The Lees carried out upgrades in the past few years, ushering in new widescreen TVs and a new, second TAB ‘U-Bet’ facility into the sports bar.
While incorporating core elements of accommodation, gaming and f&b, it’s said to stand to benefit from refreshing the rooms, to increase room rates and demand in a town with plenty of need for short-term stays, the gaming has approval for 45 machines and would benefit from upgraded hardware, and the pub is without a retail offering and could incorporate up to three detached bottleshops.
The property last sold in 2013 for slightly over $5 million. The Lees tentatively put it to open market in July 2020, as pubs reopened from the pandemic shutdown, looking for $6.75 million.
It has sold now to new owners said to include to “investors from NSW” behind local resident and AHA doyen Pat Gurr, who previously owned the Whitebull Hotel in Armidale.
Sale was through Ray White Commercial’s Geoff Percy and Australian Hotel Brokers’ Scott Williams, who were unable to speak on the purchaser but suggested the Shamrock was about to see “a transformation” over the coming months.
