Pellicano Gets Greenlit on Glitter Strip’s BtR ‘Golden Mile’

It has become the golden mile for Queensland’s emerging build-to-rent sector, where hundreds of apartments have been given the development nod in a bid to refill a dried-up rental pool.

Stadium Drive at Robina—a suburb about 10km south-west of Surfers Paradise—is earmarked for six approved medium-rise towers accommodating more than 700 apartments. 

Significantly bolstering the street’s build-to-rent tally, the green light has been given to Pellicano Group’s $225-million four-tower Paloma House development.

The approval comes eight months after the developer unveiled its plans for the Gold Coast build-to-rent play.

It will comprise 418 apartments—including 310 build-to-rent and 108 short-stay units—in a resort-style scheme designed by Rothelowman for a 1.5ha site at 33-45 Stadium Drive.

Under the plans, the towers will rise 9 to 10 levels and include almost 8000sq m of resident amenities with a wellness centre, gym, steam room, sauna, cinema, residents’ lounge and work-from-home spaces.

The development also will feature ground-floor recreational facilities including a pool, poolside pavilion, private lounges, alfresco kitchen, dining areas, a tennis court, yoga lawn, garden lounge and bocce court.

Next to Cbus Super Stadium and Robina City Parklands, the site is just up the road from a 1.4ha holding greenlit for US-based build-to-rent giant Sentinel’s Queensland debut, a 300-apartment development.

Sentinel’s Cera Stribley-designed project will comprise two towers rising 9 storeys connected by a podium.

The go-ahead for the two Stadium Drive build-to-rent developments is a boon for the city’s highly constrained residential market, which has been deemed ground-zero for Australia’s housing supply crisis.

▲ Renders of Pellicano's four-tower development approved for Stadium Drive at Robina.

Amid unprecedented population growth and a huge influx of returning overseas students, rents have soared in the past few years as the city’s vacancy rate plunged to a record low. The latest data indicates it is still lingering at about 1 per cent.

“The Gold Coast is a little bit on steroids in relation to the supply crunch, particularly in the rental market,” then Real Estate Institute of Australia president Hayden Groves said at an industry roundtable last year.

“It’s a microcosm example of what is going on around the rest of Australia … it’s an intensified market.”

Pellicano’s Paloma House development is the latest addition to the group’s rapidly expanding pipeline of 2000 build-to-rent apartment projects in Queensland and Victoria.

On completion, it will be managed under the Pellicano Living platform, which includes more than 600 apartments across 10 locations.

“Build-to-rent will continue to be a key area of focus for Pellicano moving forward,” Pellicano managing director Nando Pellicano said at the time of the lodging the development application.

The approval of Pellicano’s Robina development follows another significant addition to south-east Queensland’s future housing stocks.

Canadian-based property investment colossus Brookfield has been given the go ahead for its $400-million debut into Australia’s build-to-rent sector.

Economic Development Queensland paved the way for the global big-hitter’s entrance into the market, granting approval for the 560-apartment project on Brisbane’s riverfront.

Comprising two 23-storey towers, the development will rise from Brookfield’s $1.3-billion Portside Wharf precinct at Hamilton in the city’s inner-north.

The developer and asset manager lodged its development application in May last year under EDQ’s Northshore Hamilton Priority Development Area scheme. 

The build-to-rent play signals the maturing of the burgeoning asset class in Australia.

Brookfield is one of the world’s biggest multi-family/build-to-rent asset owners. It has more than $US18 billion and 60,000 apartments under management in the sector globally.