Beach boys fuelled up with $250m portfolio
The beach boys, two Gold Coast developers who ‘fuelled’ their business by building service stations, are heading into higheroctane territory. Oceanfront residents Marcus Dore and Geordie Whitcombe, after taking a four-year ‘sabbatical’ from commercial and retail projects have headed back to their knitting, bigtime.
They’ve built up a $250m project portfolio, one without servos but one in which the Gold Coast isn’t forgotten.
The partners, who own the BluePoint group, have assembled a workload that stretches from Burleigh Waters to central Queensland and is worth in excess of $250m.
The standout in that load includes their biggest venture – a mixed-use centre that will have an end value in excess of $100m.
The 30,000sq m multi-stage project is to emerge on 7ha at Flagstone, west of Brisbane.
That development’s a far cry from BluePoint’s birth three years after Marcus and Geordie first met in 2009.
Marcus at that time was working for the Tilapea Partners group, whose project list included a retail centre at Pimpama.
Kiwi Geordie was a development manager for Woolworths and had an overseeing role in the building of warehouses for the doomed Masters hardware chain.
They soon literally stepped into the oil industry, building servos, and started with a 7-Eleven one fronting the M1 at Carrara and with a store and takeaway outlets.
By 2017 BluePoint had developed 13 servos, at one point selling six 7-Eleven ones to a property fund for $59m.
On the heels of that sale, BluePoint stepped into the residential arena.
It previously had ventured into that field, building nearly 160 townhouses in Brisbane.
This time round Palm Beach, on the verge of an apartment surge, was the target.
The partners in 2019 started with a tower, Sea, back from the beach in side-street Seventh Ave, and set up the BluePoint HQ at the base of the 13-floor building.
The partners, from their new offices, steered BluePoint into the development of two apartment buildings overlooking the ocean and a series of terrace homes.
Then, it seems, they saw new residential developers coming on to the scene and that construction costs were rising dramatically.
They opted out of the game to spend more time with their families – Marcus lives on the Mermaid beachfront and Geordie beside the ocean at Palm Beach.
It clearly wasn’t long before the commercial property juices started to flow again and they went out chasing development sites.
The upshot is a list of work that includes a Burleigh Waters office and medical building that is under construction. The project reflects the BluePoint preference for projects that are tenant-led.
To that end, the Burleigh Waters building is fully let, drawing international tenants in the form of EzyDog, a producer of pet accessories, and Kieser, a fitness, medical and rehabilitation operation.
The 1300sq m building also will house a new BluePoint head office and a cafe.
Also on the company’s agenda are a 7000sq m Coles-anchored neighbourhood centre in Brisbane suburb Pallara and a similar centre, again with Coles as the key tenant, at Bargara, east of Bundaberg.
The smallest undertaking on BluePoint’s list is a freestanding Guzman Y Gomez restaurant, which is nearing completion in the centre of Maryborough.
HERE’S HOPING IT SELLS
Developer Jim Raptis and fellow members of the Greek Orthodox community will be hoping it’s a case of third time lucky as a fresh effort is made to sell vacant land close to the community’s Bundall church.
Jim’s the sole director of the company that owns the 2429sq m Frigo Crt site, which is being used for parking, but does not show as a shareholder.
It was bought for $870,000 in 2003 and attempts to attract ‘reasonable offers’ for it started on the heels of the GFC and ran until 2017.
The land’s in an office precinct opposite the city council’s HOTA centre.
POLITIS’ $4.4M PURCHASE
Nick Politis, 82-year-old Sydney car dealer, has added to his Gold Coast interests with a $4.4 m buy just up the road from his Porsche dealership in Southport.
The Sydney Roosters NRL chairman and former Ipswich Grammar student has bought a 2800sq m property at the western end of Harvest Crt that’s been in the family of the late Fred Morris for decades. Nick, who also owns the Jaguar and Land-Rover dealerships in Southport, is getting income from the property, which is occupied by nine showrooms and four factories.
RECORD MAIN BEACH SALE
Michael Willems, an agent who sold more than $1bn worth of property in the housing market’s top end before focusing on commercial real estate, has sold his own pad for a record.
He’s fetched $6.35m for a secondlevel apartment in M3565, a boutique Main Beach beachfront block built by Harvey Norman CEO Katie Page.
Michael and wife Dayna paid $4.5m for the apartment four years ago. The figure achieved by the Willems tops the M3565 record of $6.25m set by recruitment industry queen Sarina Russo in 2021.