What’s being touted as Melbourne’s most sustainable office tower comes to market this week with an asking price of $160 million for the northern city fringe development.
Impact Investment Group, backed by Melbourne’s Liberman family, is preparing to sell 54 Wellington—a 12-storey main building and five-storey secondary building with a total 15,000sq m of floor space in Collingwood.
Selling agents Cushman and Wakefield say the A-grade building has 82 per cent occupancy.
Those tenants include Bank Australia, the Commons Co-Working Group, Australia’s first truth-telling body the Yoorrook Justice Commission, NDIS services provider Expression Australia, and Today.
“Now majority leased, we think the time is right to bring 54 Wellington to market for a sale,” Impact’s head of asset management Dan Colman said, when asked why the property was on the market.
“We have created an incredibly unique investment proposition, blending market-leading physical sustainability in a property with a tenant profile of high-performing, for purpose tenants,” he said.
Cushman says the building’s real drawcard is its sustainability. It has a six-star Green Star rating and five-star Nabers rating as well as a platinum Well Health and Safety rating.
“Our mission has always been to shift capital towards investments that blend financial returns with deep social and environmental impact,” Colman said.
Designed by John Wardle Architects, the development was built over the top of a fully-operational telephone exchange. It includes a rooftop garden, wellness facilities and ground floor retail as well as end-of-trip facilities with showers, lockers and bike parking.
Cushman’s Leigh Melbourne said the Collingwood tower was an outstanding investment opportunity for local and offshore capital looking for a premium investment with environmental upside.
“Furthermore, in recent years, there has been an increase in the number of companies that are certified as sustainable and responsible workplaces. This is a positive trend, and one that is likely to continue as the pressure on businesses to operate sustainably increases.”
The development has had a troubled history. Originally put together by then builder-developer Grocon, it was acquired by Impact on a fund-through deal in 2017.
“Much of the project’s construction took place during the pandemic—a particularly challenging time for the construction industry,” Colman said.
The collapse of Grocon in 2020 further delayed the project and cost Impact upwards of $18 million. In August of 2021, Corsair Investment Management agreed a $60-million debt facility to allow Impact to finish the project.
Impact Investment Group is fully owned by Small Giants, which according to its website was founded in 2007 by Danny Almagor and Berry Liberman “to create, support, nurture and empower businesses and entrepreneurs that are shifting us to a more socially equitable and environmentally regenerative world.”
Design and engineering consultants Aurecon said the building’s engineered timber had a lower carbon footprint than traditional building materials and was sourced from certified sustainably-managed forests.
Double-glazed facade glass, operable windows for passive ventilation, rainwater capture and reuse for greening the building’s rooftop terraces, and the integration of solar panels on the roof were all part of the strategy.
Arecon estimates the initiatives saved about 47,400 tonnes of embodied carbon across the project.
Cushman’s Nick Rathgeber said he expected significant interest from offshore and domestic investors looking to increase their exposure to the growing global trend of institutional grade buildings in creative inner-city locations.
An international expression of interest campaign will end on November 3.
