Cushman & Wakefield Brokers Sale of Melbourne Office Tower for A$830M

Cushman & Wakefield (NYSE: CWK) announced recently that it brokered the 47-story, Class A commercial office tower at 242 Exhibition Street in Melbourne’s central business district (CBD) on behalf of Oxford Investa Property Partners (OIPP) and the Investa Property Fund in an off-market A$830 million transaction (approx. US$570 million). The office tower was jointly acquired by Charter Hall and Canada’s Public Sector Pension Investment Board.

Cushman & Wakefield’s Head of Capital Markets, Australia and New Zealand, Josh Cullen and Head of Capital Markets, Victoria, Luke Etherington managed the sale on behalf of the vendors, which is expected to settle in the first half of fiscal year 2020.

The office tower is situated in the northeastern precinct of Melbourne’s CBD and is currently 100 percent occupied by Telstra with an 11.5-year weighted average lease expiry. The building comprises approximately 709,000 square feet (sf) of net lettable area, including 27,000 sf of retail and 346 car parking bays. The sale followed a recent A$67 million (approx. US$46 million) upgrade to the lifts and base building areas.

"We are extremely pleased to have delivered a favorable outcome for both the purchasers, Charter Hall with backing from the Public Sector Pension Investment Board, and the vendors, Oxford Properties and Investa,” said Cullen. "Cushman & Wakefield introduced the purchasers off-market at pricing that represented a premium to Book Value and then negotiated with the owners.”

"The 242 Exhibition Street sale represented a yield of approximately 4.5 percent and was supported by a stable long-term tenant as well as the strength of office leasing conditions in the Melbourne CBD more broadly,” said Etherington. "The deal follows a record financial year for investment in office assets nationally, which helped push overall Australian commercial real estate transactions to a new high.”

About Cushman & Wakefield

Cushman & Wakefield (NYSE: CWK) is a leading global real estate services firm that delivers exceptional value for real estate occupiers and owners. Cushman & Wakefield is among the largest real estate services firms with 51,000 employees in approximately 400 offices and 70 countries. In 2018, the firm had revenue of US$8.2 billion across core services of property, facilities and project management, leasing, capital markets, valuation and other services. To learn more, visit www.cushmanwakefield.com or follow @CushWake on Twitter.

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