Charter Hall has boosted its industrial portfolio with the purchase of a site in Wetherill Park, Sydney for $33 million from GWA Group.
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The site, which will be in the Charter Hall Core Plus Industrial Fund (CPIF), covers 41,000 square metres, or eight hectares. A facility on the site was constructed in 2006. The property was sold through JLL's Michael Wall and Michael Fenton.
GWA Group, which manufactures Caroma bathroom fittings, had identified the site as non-core after the closure of a manufacturing facility in December 2014. The property has been the subject of an extensive sale process.
After completion, GWA will lease back the premises from Charter Hall for three years for warehousing purposes.
CPIF fund manager Paul Ford said the acquisition was consistent with the group's strategy of acquiring properties in land-constrained areas, leased to quality tenants and with the ability to unlock value.
"We have been actively reweighting our portfolio over the past three years towards the Sydney industrial market in light of improving fundamentals, whilst also selectively acquiring assets where we can provide enhanced returns for our investors, leveraging off the fund's sound position with its long-weighted average lease expiry and 100 per cent occupancy," Mr Ford said.
On settlement, which is due in June, the acquisition will increase the CPIF portfolio value to more than $1 billion with a development pipeline of about $250 million and an average lease expiry life of 7.4 years.
The property is well located for the M4 and M7 motorways. Access to Wetherill Park has improved since the recent extension of Reconciliation Road.
The sale comes as demand for industrial property grows. Australian real estate investment trusts acquired more than $225 million worth of development sites, with a focus on the Western Sydney precinct, in the past year.
Savills industrial agents expect the Sydney industrial investment market to remain strong because the weight of funds from local REITs, coupled with overseas third-party capital seeking to invest in Australia, has created a seller's market.
The lack of investment grade stock available helped to tighten yields in 2014. They are expected to tighten further in 2015.
