New owners plan $30m hotel

Another attempt will be made to build a new hotel on a central Christchurch site where two previous development plans have run aground.

Holy Eagle Investments has bought 818 Colombo St, just north of the Christchurch Town Hall and the partly-built Convention Centre, for $1.35 million in a mortgagee sale.

Director and shareholder Patrick Cui said it was planning a $20m to $30m hotel, but was still finalising details and seeking another investor before going ahead.

The previous owners, Auckland developer Andrew Fonagy and Christchurch developer Richmond Paynter, bought the land for $2m after the earthquakes to build the Miro Apartments, which were priced at up to $2.6m.

When that proved too ambitious for the market, Fonagy bought out Paynter and got resource consent for a sevenstorey, 48-apartment hotel with luxury apartments on top. However, that plan also foundered, and the property’s mortgagee started looking for a buyer last year.

In more fallout from the failed previous project, the High Court last month froze proceeds of Fonagy’s upcoming property sales over fears he would shift assets to the Cook Islands to avoid paying debts.

Fonagy’s resource consent for the Colombo project remains valid for new owners of the property.

Christchurch-based Cui said Holy Eagle intended to build a four- or five-star hotel that would be managed by a hotel company.

It looked as though it would be lower than the seven storeys approved for the site because of the cost, he said.

‘‘It’s not a small project, so we will have to take it carefully.’’