Apartment owners unite to sell whole unit blocks
The Australian Business Review
By Samantha Hutchinson

More than three full apartment blocks have come to the market in the past month.

A wave of property sales across Sydney sparked by neighbours banding together to offload their homes in one line has spread to the apartment sector, with unit owners clubbing together to sell entire buildings for redevelopment.

More than three full apartment blocks have come to the market in the past month, in sales campaigns driven by surging demand from developers hunting for existing apartment buildings which they can upgrade for higher rental returns.

In Marrickville, a family is offloading a building with 46 studio and one-bedroom apartment owners at 11-13 Osgood Avenue. In Coogee, another family has come to market with a block of 24 apartments at 326 Arden Street.

Both sales are being handled by CBRE agents, who noted that interest from apartment owners in in-line sales is increasing, particularly as more sales reveal they are netting steep premiums selling their units in one line than they would individually.

“Investors (like them because they) have the ability to create significant value by transforming all of the units into one-bedroom apartments to increase the rentals,” said CBRE agent Peter Vines, who holds the Marrickville listing, adding that he believed strata dealers who renovated and sold down whole unit blocks could be attracted to the site, in addition to government agencies and affordable housing groups.

Fellow agent Nick Heaton, who holds the listing in Coogee, said a string of recent sales had been influential, encouraging more owners to consider selling in one line.

Twelve owners in an apartment block in Queenscliff near Manly netted about $850,000 each for ageing two-bedroom apartments when they sold their building in one line for $10.1m to a developer. In another campaign, 18 separate owners came together to offload an apartment block at 30 Clio Street and 50-52 Glencoe Street in Sutherland for $8.85m after attracting over 150 inquiries.

“The ability to purchase an entire block of units, particularly of this size, is exceptionally rare,” Mr Heaton said.

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