Blackstone on final leg of mega mall sell-off
Blackstone is looking to divest a $400 million suburban Melbourne shopping centre, the last asset in a $3 billion portfolio of Australian malls that the US private equity giant accumulated and had once hoped to sell en masse.
With that ambitious plan shelved almost a decade ago, Blackstone instead plotted its way through a staged exit from a portfolio of about 10 regional and sub-regional malls. The last step in that journey is Greensborough Plaza, which sits on a 6.7 hectare site in Melbourne’s north and generates about $365 million in turnover annually.
Blackstone has timed its move – it has appointed JLL’s Nick Willis and Sam Hatcher along with CBRE’s Simon Rooney to broker the mall – amid an upsurge of deal making across the retail real estate sector. Transactions hit a record of $13.5 billion last year as a range of buyers, from syndicator to super funds, grew more confident in the sector’s recovery.
Amid the recent flurry of headline deals, ASX-listed Scentre sold a 19.9 per cent interest in the jewel in its crown, Westfield Sydney, to the Australian Retirement Trust for $864 million just two days before Christmas.
Last month, a Melbourne-based fund manager, Fawkner Property, finalised its landmark $895 million acquisition of Erina Fair on the NSW Central Coast, in the largest 100 per cent trade of an Australian shopping centre.
The momentum is pulling more opportunities into the market including a half stake in Westfield Marion, Adelaide’s largest shopping centre and held by a Singaporean investor, which is up for grabs with a price tag of $650 million.
The Greensborough Plaza offering coincided with what Blackstone’s top brass expected to be a busy period of transactions, after reporting better than expected fourth-quarter earnings last month.
Summarising that bullish outlook in a LinkedIn video post, Blackstone president Jon Gray said he was “super pumped” as the initial public offering market reopened and deal making hit “escape velocity”.
