25 posts tagged “trilogy”

Devine is not proceeding with its French Quarter hotel and apartment project in Alice Street.  The site was listed for sale in today's AFR.  Story in the Courier Mail:

Twin tower plans for Brisbane axed by Devine
Michelle Hele | September 17, 2009 12:00am | CM

ANOTHER residential tower project has fallen over in the Brisbane CBD, with Devine pulling out of its $1 billion French Quarter development.   An international competition was held to pick its designer and it was to house the most expensive apartments in Brisbane – up to $15 million.

Devine spent years buying up individual apartments in buildings which are currently on the land so it could control the site on the corner of Albert, Alice and Margaret streets.   Stage one was to feature a tower with a luxury six-star hotel, with apartments on top, retail and commercial space on the lower levels and Parisian-style cafes and walkways.

But with Devine appointing agents to sell the property it seems unlikely it will ever be delivered.

Meanwhile, Austcorp's Vision Tower is still in limbo with no work carried out for months and some of the group's companies in the hands of voluntary administrators.

Work is also delayed on Trilogy Tower, an $800 million project on the site of the former Red Cross Blood Bank, and Metacap scrapped plans for its $500 million Empire Square tower on Elizabeth St.

Geoff McIntyre of Jones Lang LaSalle and Rick Bird of Ray White Transact have been appointed to sell the French Quarter site and will market the property internationally.  Mr McIntyre said it was a one-in-a-million site.  Mr Bird spent months negotiating the individual purchase of units in the apartment blocks. The agents said the plan was to sell the property to another party which would go ahead with the project.

Devine managing director David Devine said he was disappointed but after a review of operations the company realised house and land packages were providing a better short-term return at lower risk.  The group was also reviewing its land holdings in Queensland and would sell some soon.

Mr Devine said the focus now would be on buying more land in Victoria so the group could turn it into profits quickly.

"You can't do everything that you want to do," he said.   "It is disappointing but the fact is that our business is exceptionally good on the house and land front where demand is high and supply is low.  We have too much land in some areas in Queensland and we are looking at selling that."

Mr Devine said good sites such as the French Quarter site would sell in any market. Offers to purchase French Quarter close on November 12. Mr McIntyre said in a good market the site could make up to $90 million.  Mr Bird said with all the work that had gone into planning, a developer would have a significant head start on the project.

"THE last apartments in the Drift development at Casuarina will be up for grabs via a liquidation sale, after developer APH Properties announced a major sell-off of its final holdings in the project."

"On completion in 2010, the Casuarina community is expected to include 600 beach homes and 1500 apartments and villas, along with commercial and recreational facilities."

Source:  GC

Prices still seem high.  They are listed at $685,000 to $900,000 for a three bedroom apartment.

I will avoid this development and location! 

APH is the developer who is trying to get Trilogy Towers off the ground - so maybe they need cash to proceed with Trilogy?  The sales agent said that APH had finance, and would start work in February this year, but clearly that was not the case.

From various reports, it seems that the Trilogy Tower project has been put on hold.  Construction was said to be starting in February 2009, but that start date appears to have been deferred.  They have not advertised in the Courier Mail for months.

At the beginning of 2008, I made a number of predictions in this post.

The predictions were mostly wrong!

The Brisbane apartment market did not grow significantly in 2008, and took a minor step backwards.  At present, there are fewer buyers and more sellers.  For some off-the-plan developments, no sales have been made for months.  Second tier buildings and buildings with more than 200 apartments have not done well.

So I will be careful with my predictions for 2009:

I still believe that quality inner city apartments in Brisbane will do well in 2009.  Provided there is no significant unemployment and foreign students continue to come to Brisbane, vacancy rates will remain low. 

In 2008, only four new inner city apartment buildings completed and settled.  These were Evolution (over priced), M on Mary (which has mostly 1 bedroom apartments, and the developer is now in liquidation), Flow at West End and Iceworks at Paddington.  In 2009, no new large inner city apartments will settle.  Groundwork has started on Mertion's Soleil and the Trilogy Tower project, but these will no complete until 2012.  Mirvac's Tennyson Reach project will settle two buildings in 2009, and FKP's SL8 at West End will also probably complete in 2009.  So not much new stock.

So here are some predictions for 2009:

• The price of a good quality 2 bedroom 2 bathroom apartment in Brisbane, with views, will range from $780,000 to $850,000.
• The price of an average quality 2 bedroom 2 bathroom apartment in Brisbane will struggle to pass $550,000.
• Average rent for an unfurnished 2 bedroom apartment will rise to $600 per week.
• Investors will return to the market, as interest rates are falling and rents are rising.
• There will be more action in the inner suburbs than in the city. Prices for quality apartments in areas such as Indooroopilly and Toowong (where there is a train station and regional shopping, close to education facilities) will boom. By the end on 2008, it will be hard to find a good quality 2 bedroom apartment in these areas for less than $600,000.

• The Gold Coast apartment market will tank even more.  The Sunshine Coast apartment market will remain steady.

With Empire Square gone, and Vision in doubt, it seems that the only two large inner city high rise on the horizon are Trilogy Tower and Meriton's Soleil.  Both are similar heights, in a similar location, and are apartments without balconies.  Both will have hotel / serviced apartments.  Both will complete about the same time.  I hear that some people who were initially interested in Trilogy are now interested in Soleil.  They are different products.  Soleil is cheaper on a price per sqm basis.

Trilogy (Mirvac managed hotel apartments) (residential apartments not yet on sale so not part of this comparision)

• 16 apartments per floor, over 12 levels.  192 apartments in total
• 3 elevators
• 1 and 2 bedroom configurations
• sold furnished, if one signs up with Mirvac
• 6% rental guarantee
• on sale for more than 3 months
• about 60 to 70 reported as sold
• one bedroom size - 53 to 59 sqm, most without car parking
• two bedroom size - 70 to 89 sqm, with 1 car park

Example pricing for 1 bedroom:
Level 35, East view - $530,000
Level 41, East view - $555,000
Level 41, River view - $570,000
2 bedrooms:
Level 35, river view - $890,000
Level 37, corner apartment, NE river view - $945,000
Level 37, corner apartment, SE river view - $940,000

Soleil - residential apartments

• 5 to 7 apartments per floor.  188 apartments on sale, with others being held by developer
  
• 3 elevators
• 1, 2 and 3 bedroom configurations
• sold unfurnished
• rental guarantee
• on sale for about 10 days
  
• less than 10 sold
  
• one bedroom size - 46 to 62 sqm, without car parking
• two bedroom size - 71 to 83 sqm, with 1 car park

2 bedroom apartments
Level 31, city view over Adelaide Street: $509,000
Level 40, views over All Hallows: $615,000
Level 42, views towards The Valley: $610,000
Level 42: views of River Place, and maybe Storey Bridge:  $672,000
Level 47: views over Skyline towards the river:  $755,000

There is likely to be a shortage of apartments in Brisbane in the near future.  (This statement assumes that that is not massive unemployment in Brisbane.)  There are few developments under construction, and so very little new stock will come onto the market in the next three years.  What new stock remains unsold is either overpriced or poor quality.

Downtown Apartments

• M on Mary - completed - mostly poor quality 1 bedroom apartments, mostly unsold.  Developer has ceased sales campaign and is running this building as short term accommodation
• Evolution - completed - about 20 apartments unsold - small and overpriced
• Skyline - completed - about 20 apartments unsold - building surrounded by other buildings, and generally overpriced
• Aurora - completed
  
• Empire Square - cancelled
• Trilogy Tower - status uncertain - in presales, with planned completion in 2012 - both hotel rooms and expensive apartments
• Vision - status uncertain - in presales, with completion not before 2012
  
• Soleil Tower - soon to start presales - 403 apartments, with completion about 2011
• French Quarter - early days, no planning approval
  

Inner City

• Flow (West End) - completed - about 5 remain unsold, will negotiate on price to sell
  
• Koko (West End) - completed - about 5 remain unsold, will negotiate on price to sell
• Tempo (West End) - completed - about 5 remain unsold, will negotiate on price to sell
• IceWorks (Paddington) - almost complete - about 6 apartments remain unsold
  
• SL8 (West End) - under construction, with completion expected in April 2009, poor location
• Waters Edge (West End) - off-the-plan selling, overpriced and selling poorly, completion in 2010
• Ciana (Indooroopilly) - almost complete - about 25 out of 130 apartments remain unsold - good value
  
• Tennyson Reach - 2 buildings nearing completion, 1 building not far behind, 3 more buildings planned
• Newstead Waterfront - 2 buildings selling well off-the-plan
• The Mill at Albion - almost sold out, relatively expensive
• El Dorado Village - to be launched to the marketing in October 2008, completion likely in 2011
• Milton Union - received planning approval

See this AFR story, which says that Vision does not have finance and no construction contract has been signed.  Trilogy sounds more optimistic. It reports that 74 out of 192 hotel apartments have been sold.  The Westin Empire Square -- hard to tell what is actually happening -- sales are good, but no finance yet.

See this video.

A similar story from the Brisbane Times, which is a little misleading because presales we going on for months:

Brisbane skyscraper nets $50 million in first week
Shannon Molloy | September 19, 2008 - 10:23AM

Investors have swooped on a new mixed-use CBD skyscraper development and snapped up more than 70 hotel suites in less than a week, resulting in a $50 million sales success.

Standing at 265m and boasting residential, hotel and office space, the Trilogy Tower project on Queen Street will be one the city's tallest buildings when complete.

Developer APH Capital caused a stir last weekend when it officially opened sales for its luxury hotel suites, which represent the first new five-star product to be released to the local market in more than a decade.

More than 30 per cent of the hotel component has sold since last weekend, generating at least $50 million.

Brisbane has one of the highest hotel occupancy rates in the world and the hotel market has been bustling with investor activity in recent years.

APH managing director John Wilson said the success at Trilogy highlighted the continuing strength in the market.

"It shows there's a huge awareness of the demand for new hotel room stock and a particular need for five-star rooms in the Brisbane CBD," Mr Wilson said.

"The response to the product has been nothing less than sensational."

Trilogy Hotel, to be managed by Mirvac Hotels and Resorts, will comprise 192 fully-furnished one- and two-bedroom apartment suites.

The rest of the tower will also be home to a luxury residents and an office component featuring 31,000 square metres of space over 28 levels.

Construction is expected to be complete in 2012.

Demolition has started on the site for the Trilogy building in Brisbane.

The building will include a Mirvac managed hotel.  Mirvac is not the developer and is not doing the construction.  It is uncertain whether a construction contract has been signed, and construction finance probably has not been obtained yet. 

The hotel component includes 192 strata titled 1 and 2 bedroom suites.  These are now in pre-release, with pricing starting at $480,000 and going up to $1M.  According to my survey, between 60 and 70 have been sold.  The public launch has been delayed, and is likely to be early September.  The developer is offering a 6% rent guarantee for 2 years, with settlement due in 2012.

Google has an interesting service, that allows you to see what people are searching for on Google.

It is called Google Insights.  It is helpful when making investment decisions.

For example, when looking at searches conducted in Australia over the past 12 months, the following are relative rankings of various searches:

trilogy brisbane	27
mill albion	38
empire square	44
westin brisbane	21
sl8	13

mirvac	59
pradella	1
devine	62
fkp	10
stockland	56

indooroopilly	62
new farm	40
west end	54
st lucia	19
toowong	44