Brisbane’s Redbank shopping centre sells for $160m

February 3, 2017 Matthew Cranston Property Editor Redbank Plains retail centre, south of Brisbane, services an area estimated at more than 50,600 residents with robust forecast population growth in the next decade. Photo: Supplied Alceon and Brisbane-based developer Capital Transactions have sold their sub-regional shopping centre development at Redbank Plains, south of the city, for $160 million to Singapore’s Rockworth Capital Partners. Rockworth already has more than $700 million in assets under management comprising primarily retail properties in Australia. Rockworth Asset Management executive director Lim Su Kiat was unable to give details on the deal, which was struck on a yield of about 6 per cent through JLL’s Simon Rooney and Sam Hatcher. “I can’t go into specifics,” Mr Lim said, ” but we are always looking for different retail assets.” The 27,000-square-metre centre is anchored by a Woolworths, Coles, Aldi, Target and Daiso and is currently 95 per cent leased following a 20,000-square-metre expansion by Alceon and Capital Transactions. Alceon and Capital Transactions snapped up the Redbank Plains Shopping Village and adjoining land from Queensland coal entrepreneur Paul Darrouzet in 2013 before undertaking the major expansion. The centre serves a trade area estimated at more than 50,600 residents with robust forecast population growth of nearly 65,200 people in the next decade. Yields squeezed Alceon proceeded to appoint JLL to sell the asset in 2015 at a time when demand for sub-regional centres was increasing rapidly. With a shortage of sub-regional malls available to transact, yields have been squeezed in the sector over the past 12 months by about 40 basis points. The average yield on such malls now stands at less than 6.61 per cent nationally. Major recent transactions include Charter Hall Retail REIT’s purchase of Arana Hills Plaza in Brisbane and an adjoining Shell petrol station from super fund investor ISPT for $67.1 million, sold also through JLL. In December British investment giant M&G Real Estate bought Scentre Group’s Casey Central Shopping Centre in the far south of Melbourne for more than $220 million and set a new record for yields on sub-regional shopping centres. M&G Real Estate, one of the world’s largest property investors, purchased the centre on a fully leased yield of about 5.5 per cent. The closest yields for sub-regionals over $100 million include Runaway Bay in Queensland, on 5.91 per cent fully leased, and The Shops at Ellenbrook in Western Australia on 5.75 per cent.

False fresh bread claims cost Coles $2.5m

COLES has been ordered to pay a $2.5 million penalty for falsely advertising “freshly baked” bread when it had been par-baked off-site — sometimes months earlier. The federal court found the supermarket giant had deceptively represented bread that had been partially baked and frozen off-site, promoting it as “Baked Today, Sold Today” or “Freshly Baked In-Store”. Coles had already been slapped with a three-year ban preventing it from advertising its bread as freshly baked, and was ordered to display signs saying it had breached Australian consumer law. The consumer watchdog launched an investigation after former Victorian premier Jeff Kennett discovered a loaf of Coles bread that was advertised as freshly baked in-store had been made in Ireland. Originally published as ‘Fresh bread’ claims cost Coles $2.5m