Fundie adds Potts Point's Larmont Hotel to portfolio
Developer, fund manager and accommodation operator Pro-invest Group has capped off a busy year after purchasing the Larmont Hotel behind the Kings Cross Coca-Cola sign in Potts Point for $46.25 million.
Pro-invest, whose portfolio includes a chain of Holiday Inn Express and Voco hotels as well as the Kimpton Hotel in the Sydney CBD, acquired the 103-room Larmont at a more than 15 per cent discount to the original $55 million asking price when it hit the market in 2019.
The hotel sits just behind the Coca-Cola sign and forms part of a mixed-use commercial building that includes offices and apartments.
The vendors were Singapore-listed real estate developer and investor Amcorp Global, which held a 55 per cent stake in the hotel alongside another Singaporean company Kenmooreland (35 per cent) and a 10 per cent stake held by Melbourne hoteliers Jan and Peter Clark, whose Lancemore group operates the boutique property.
The hotel last traded in 2014, when Singapore-listed developer TEE Land, Lancemore and Kenmooreland purchased what was then the 76-room Diamant Hotel from former Young Rich Lister Paul Fischmann’s 8Hotels group for $23.2 million.
The investors then spent another $12 million acquiring the privately held apartments on levels 11 and 12 of the building and turning the 24 units into more hotel rooms. The hotel was then renamed the Larmont Sydney by Lancemore.
Amcorp Global acquired its 55 per cent stake in the hotel after it took over TEE Land in 2020.
The purchase price comprised $43 million for the property at 2-14 Kings Cross Road and $3.25 million for the hotel business.
For Pro-invest, the acquisition through one of its global hospitality funds, adds to a portfolio of over 4500 rooms spread across 22 mid-scale and lifestyle hotels in Australia and New Zealand.
In September, Pro-invest secured approval for its first commercial tower in Australia, a $1 billion skyscraper due to be completed in North Sydney by 2026.
Also in September, Pro-invest opened the Sebel Canberra Campbell, first hotel purchased as part of a $500 million fund that will acquire distressed hotels at the more upper end of the market and then revamp them.
Under its new Vista Hospitality Group – a new management platform in partnership with Next Story Group – Pro-invest opened the Hotel Indigo Brisbane City Centre and the Voco Brisbane City Centre and in May, Pro-invest opened a Holiday Inn Express & Suites at Maroochydoore on the Sunshine Coast.
In May, Pro-invest put a $1 billion portfolio of eight Holiday Inn Express hotels on the market – seven in Australia and one in New Zealand – but it has yet to transact.
As of September, almost $2 billion of hotels had changed hands in Australia this year, according to a third-quarter update from Savills – in line with long-term historical averages.
Sales over the past few months include the 176-room Rydges Sydney Harbour acquired by Syrian billionaire Ghassan Aboud’s Crystalbrook Collection for about $100 million and the nearby 59-room Harbour Rocks Hotel purchased by Indonesia’s Karim family for almost $40 million.
