Elegance not such a pretty picture now
THE word elegance can evoke a vision of a slender and graceful woman in a classic, flowing gown. Unfortunately for a Chinese group that two years ago took the robes off an ambitious Mermaid Beach project called Elegance, things have been far from flowing.
The Hubei United Development group intended to have the twin-tower project, on a former Hungry Jack’s site and described as providing a mecca for health and wellbeing, under way in 2017.
Its plan hasn’t gone to plan. Sales, unlike classic gowns, haven’t flowed, despite a vigorous run in the project’s early days.
The Elegance sales office in the main street of Surfers Paradise is closed and has been stripped.
The 47 and 49-level towers, earmarked for a rather expensive highway-front site, don’t look like becoming a reality any time soon.
That’s the latest bad news for Chinese groups who have descended on the Gold Coast with lusty ambition in the past five years or so.
Should Elegance be further delayed, or canned, it’s not a Chinese company that will be embarrassed, as were Dalian Wanda with the Jewel towers and Forise with the Spirit super-tower.
No, it will be Hubei owner, the Hubei Provincial People’s Government.
Hubei took control of the 3783sq m Elegance site, whose previous owners have included the Nikiforides family’s Niecon group and developer John Fish, via subsidiary UMB Properties in 2016.
A company that bought the property for $4.268 million in 2011 sold it to UMB for $34.1 million three days after the city council gave the twin towers the green light.
The idea of building two ‘elegant’ towers with 522 apartments on a former burger site probably never would have cut the mustard with any of the Gold Coast’s traditional high-rise developers.
They also would have baulked at paying
$34.1 million for a site that wasn’t in the middle of it all – ie, close to the heart of the Broadbeach retail-dining hub.
The location apparently was of no concern to Hubei, which in 2017 described Elegance as a milestone in overseas expansion that already had taken in diversified projects in Belgium, Russia, Kazakhstan and Vanuatu.
It described the Gold Coast as a dream tourism destination for wealthy people.
Hubei said an Elegance retail precinct would include health-food and vitamin shops, organic cafes, massage parlours and a naturopath.
Residents would have access to day spas, indoor and outdoor meditation rooms, yoga studios, and zen gardens.
The initial buyer enthusiasm, apparently mainly from within China, gave the project a promising start but sales appear quickly to have wilted.
It’s believed around 120 of the apartments are sold – or less than a quarter of those available.
Hubei’s slow progress with Elegance might be a result of Chinese government curbs on capital outflows that could be making it tough to draw development capital from within China.
The low sales volume would make it virtually impossible to get Australian funding.
Then there’s the thorny question of the effect the capital curbs might have on Elegance’s Chinese buyers – will they be able to settle if they can’t get their money out of China?
The picture might be far from elegant.