Marquette Moves into Funds Management with St Lucia Acquisition

Marquette Properties has snapped up Brisbane’s St Lucia Marketplace for $10,200,000 in an off-market transaction.

The deal was negotiated by Joe Tynan and Michael Hedger of CBRE’s Queensland Retail Investments team on behalf of a private vendor on a passing yield of 7.18%.

The three-level retail complex is anchored by a 1,094sqm IGA supermarket, supported by seven specialty stores and five first floor office suites.

The centre is located on the major thoroughfare of Hawken Drive, in the highly affluent suburb of St Lucia and delivers Marquette a well-positioned shopping centre which Managing Director Toby Lewis hopes will be the first of many as the business moves into direct funds management.

Marquette Properties was established in 2009 and the company’s goal is to become a leading property investment firm focused on value add and opportunistic commercial office and retail investments.

“Since 2009 we’ve been lucky enough to manage assets and projects for some of the largest property companies in Australia but we recently made a conscious decision to get more control in our business” Mr Lewis said. “St Lucia Marketplace was the perfect asset for us to raise money for given the quality of the location, tenancy mix and our track record in retail.”

Marquette plans a significant refurbishment of the ageing centre commencing in June which will coincide with IGA’s plans for a major internal refurbishment of their store.

Marquette’s Head of Asset Management Matthew Creagh said “The refurbishment is designed to raise the profile of the asset in the eyes of the local residents. Our goal is to retain more of the retail spend which is currently leaving the St Lucia peninsula while delivering strong distributions to investors and the prospect of significant capital growth.”