This article is from the Australian Property Journal archive
FUND manager Clarence Property has sold a brand-new Ipswich childcare centre to a private Brisbane-based investor for $7.6 million in the latest major deal for the asset class.
CBRE’s Harrison Coburn brokered the off-market deal, achieving a 5.4% yield.
Located at 1 Brooking Rise in Ripley, the 977 sqm childcare centre opened in May last year and sits on a 3,378 sqm allotment. The 154-place centre is secured by a 15-year net lease to Little Locals Early Learning Group, a privately owned business with eight childcare centres throughout south-east Queensland.
Coburn said the first-time childcare buyer was selected following a targeted off-market process, whereby CBRE approached five active groups off the recent on-market process for Lead Childcare Kallangur, which sold for $12 million, on a 5% yield.
“The buyer’s short due diligence timeframe allowed us to move and exchange contracts swiftly, which is a common theme we are seeing in this sector,” Coburn said.
He said that whilst tenant operator demand is still high, there has been a significant decrease in the number of new centres coming online given the rising construction costs experienced over the last 12 to 24 months.
The sale of the Ripley childcare centre follows a string of bigger deals in Melbourne. A Beaconsfield property has just sold for $8 million, representing a 5.05% yield on the rent from Explorers Early Learning, also through CBRE, coming after the agency also sold 46 Dendy Street, in the blue-ribbon suburb of Brighton for $17.5 million, at 5.19%, and 86 Springvale Road in Nunawading for $12.8 million, at 5.3%.
Also in Melbourne, a Bentleigh childcare centre changed hands for more than $6.7 million, on a 4.7% yield. It is occupied by Evolve Early Learning.