Community housing provider City West Housing has acquired a site with four apartment blocks in the Sydney suburb of Bankstown for $16.968 million.
Located at 30-34 Sir Joseph Banks Street, the property comprises 42 units on a 4,294 sqm amalgamated site and has a fully leased gross rent of $787,280 per annum.
The sale represents value of $404,000 per apartment and marks one of the largest apartment blocks sold in-one-line in Western Sydney over the past five years.
Three of the blocks were built in 1984, while the fourth was constructed in 2006.
The deal was brokered by the Colliers team of Harry Bui, Nick Estephen and Thomas Mosca on behalf of a private investor.
The sale comes as demand for the affordable build-to-rent (BTR) sector continues to rise due to an increasingly unaffordable housing market coupled with tax and planning reform, according to Colliers.
“Suitable sites for build-to-rent remain challenging to identify, but investors have recognised the sector as an emerging market and are positioning to look for alternative investment options such as older-style whole apartment blocks,” said Harry Bui, National Director of Colliers.
Colliers’ recent global investor survey found that multifamily/BTR was one of the top three asset classes that those surveyed would invest in.
About one in three respondents said they would target the sector, with a big focus on the Australian markets.
According to Colliers’ research, there are 3,013 purpose-built BTR units currently under construction across 11 projects nationally, all due for completion in 2022.
“We are seeing global institutional investors increasingly allocating capital to investment strategies supported by these build-to-rent themes,” Mr Bui said.
“Across Australia, we are anticipating strong and growing demand for high-quality build-to-rent assets as population growth and declining home ownership drive the need for quality rental stock.”
City West Housing owns nearly 900 apartments in prime locations across Sydney that are rented to some 1,600 residents and their families on very low-to-moderate incomes.
