The Hour Glass Limited has bought a six level freehold retail and office building for $32.8 million, in one of the world’s top 10 retail locations from Lee Tai Enterprises (Australia) Pty Ltd, a privately held company in Sydney.
Ideally located on the corner of Pitt and Market Streets, 192 Pitt Street is directly opposite Pitt Street Mall / Westfield Shopping Centre and benefits from a high volume of passing pedestrian traffic. Town Hall and the Queen Victoria Building are also all located within immediate proximity.
The deal was brokered by Dominic Ong, John Bowie Wilson and Andy Hu of Knight Frank and Jon Chomley and Harry Bui of Colliers International.
Situated on a prominent 186 square metre corner site, the six storey retail and commercial office building comprises five levels of office space, and ground floor retail, with a Net Lettable Area of 1,027 square metres. Office accommodation totals 659 square metre over the five levels, and 368 square metres of retail ground floor space plus basement.
Dominic Ong, Senior Director Asian Markets, Commercial Sales at Knight Frank, said there is enormous rental growth potential, as the building provides an opportunity for luxury retail to occupy the whole building creating a vertical retail shop in the future.
“The vertical retail concept is very popular in Asia like Japan and Hong Kong where land is very limited in the prime retail area. This building is arguably one of Australia’s best retail corners and it will be very interesting to see how this property will be transformed over the next few years,” Mr Ong said.
The Hour Glass specialises in selling luxury watches like Rolex, Patek Philippe, and Cartier. The company has been operating in Australia for 25 years in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane and manages a pan-Asian network of some 40 stores.
Mr Michael Tay, Executive Director of The Hour Glass, said: “192 Pitt Street occupies an important piece of real estate in Sydney’s CBD and more importantly, is strategically located in one of the world’s fastest growing luxury retail corridors. We are excited by the prospects the heritage status of the building offers and feel extremely privileged to be the new owner of this property.”
The property is over 75 per cent leased to the retail tenant ‘Jigsaw’, said Jon Chomley National Director, Capital Markets at Colliers.
“The subject property last changed hand approximately 25 years ago and I believe it will stay with the new owner for a long time as well,” added Mr Chomley.
