The office block with ground floor retail space sold for $41.4m. Photo / Supplied
The office block with ground floor retail space sold for $41.4m. Photo / Supplied
A building housing most of Tauranga City Council's staff has sold for what believed to be a record price for the city's CBD.
The five-storey office and retail building plus basement at 306 Cameron Rd was sold for $41.4 million.
The buyer was the Auckland-based Maat Group, which managed a new property syndicate set up for the purchase.
In 2016, the newly-built Trustpower building in Durham St was sold for $40m - labelled a CBD sales record at the time.
The property on the corner of Cameron Rd and Third Ave was previously owned by developer Manor Group Investment, which undertook a five-year development in a joint venture with Watts Group Investments.
Council consent figures valued the development at $40m.
The Cameron Rd purchase increased the value of Maat Group's 13-property portfolio value to $300m.
Maat Group managing director Neil Tuffin said investors were pleased to have a Tauranga property added to the portfolio - "particularly one of this stature".
The building was sold by Lloyd Davidson, Jim McKinlay and the late Russell Adams of Bayleys.
Davidson, who has worked on the "iconic" development since its inception in 2013, said it had been a "privilege to be involved".
The actual build took just over a year, he said, and the Inland Revenue Department took up the first tenancy in February 2017.
Anchor tenants - the department and Tauranga City Council - occupied 88 per cent of the fully-tenanted building, and other tenants included Generation New Zealand, PGG Wrightson, Pro Active Physio, Sportsfuel Supplements and Epiphany cafe.
McKinlay said the property lent itself to syndication - where a group of investors buy shares to make a large property purchase - due to its scale and the quality of the tenants, building and location.
"It ticked all the boxes."
The office block with ground floor retail space sold for $41.4m. Photo / Supplied
The syndicate offered 457 parcels of 50,000 shares, according to marketing material, and the offer was fully subscribed.
In February Tauranga City Council moved 400 staff from 2 Devonport Rd - set to undergo a $50m development - into 306 Cameron Rd.
Council chief financial officer Paul Davidson said the council had taken out a seven-year lease on the office space.
The agreement included a right of exit after three years, he said.
