TWIN SALE FUELS BID FOR NEW PETROL STATION
Seen as a promising investment, United Petroleum co-founder Eddie Hirsch has set his sights on opening a petrol station at Mermaid Beach
THE sale of two shops in Mermaid Beach to United Petroleum cofounder Eddie Hirsch has thrown the spotlight back on the service station asset class.
Companies associated with the Melbourne billionaire have paid $1.34 million for the Cheesecake Shop store at 2368 Gold Coast Hwy and $3.8 million for the Mandarin Court Chinese restaurant building at No.2374.
The two properties on the western side of the highway offer a combined site of 2089sq m and are located south of the Barry Morris-owned Mermaid Plaza, which Mr Morris is planning to redevelop.
Lachlan Harris and Chris Fort, of Avanti Commercial, negotiated both deals but declined to comment.
Kollosche Commercial sales consultant Adam Grbcic, who is marketing a BP service station property in Ipswich, said the service station asset class was the least impacted by COVID-19.
“Investors are looking for secure, passive and long-term incomeproducing assets as we come out of COVID-19,” he said.
Mr Grbcic said while service stations shared a price point with motels and retail strips, they did so without the burden of needing higher incentives to attract tenants nor significant capital expenditure to either modify or refurbish the properties for this purpose.
He said they also generally had long-term initial leases of between 10 and 15 years.
“They are not common in other retail and commercial tenancies as they comprise businesses that will either expand or downsize every three to five years,” Mr Grbcic said yesterday.
“The location of service stations also generally provide some key investment drivers which are attractive to investors such as prime corner sites and exposure to main roads.”