Embattled Chinese Housing Behemoth Sells Vic Estate

Embattled Chinese housing behemoth Country Garden has sold one of its two Australian estates.

Frasers Property has scooped up the Windermere estate in Mambourin, a growth corridor 38km south-west of Melbourne’s CBD.

It was offloaded by Risland Australia, Country Garden’s entity Down Under, who put the undeveloped portion of the 366ha estate to the market in July along with its Wilton Greens estate at Wollondilly Shire, south-west of Sydney.

A price has not been revealed, however, it is believed to have come close to the $250 million put forward when it was listed.

In 2017, Country Garden paid a record $400 million for the site.

Windermere will eventually have up to 5000 homes, four schools and a retail village.

The sale of Windermere was handled by Oliver Hay, Daniel Wolman, Marcus Neill and Leon Ma from Cushman & Wakefield.

Time is running out for Country Garden—on Friday it reportedly missed its final deadline for an interest payment on a dollar bond, putting it at risk of default.

It was due to make a $15.4-million ($US11 million) coupon repayment this week on its almost $17.5-billion dollar-denominated offshore bonds. Country Garden has about $300 billion in liabilities.