Harvey Norman buys Geraldton centre

Brisbane-based Sentinel Property Group has sold the Geraldton Homemaker Centre to Harvey Norman for $28.25 million.

Located at 208-210 North West Coastal Highway in Geraldton, the property sits on a 4.7 hectare site with a gross lettable area of 15,948 square metres.

The homemaker centre is home to 12 tenants, including The Good Guys, Super Cheap Auto, Spotlight and Forty Winks, with an average weighted lease expiry of 2.47 years.

Sentinel did not disclose the yield and sold the property inhouse.

The homemaker centre was completed in 2006 and expanded with a McDonald’s tenancy in 2010, with Sentinel purchasing the property in 2015 for $27.3 million.

Sentinel executive chairman and chief investment officer, Warren Ebert, said Geraldton Homemaker Centre was the group’s first Western Australian investment.

“The decision to sell was based on Sentinel’s strategy of buying at an opportune time and then selling based on our view of the market,” Mr Ebert said.

“Geraldton Homemaker Centre benefits from excellent exposure and has a superior tenant profile.

“Geraldton is the third most populous place in WA after Perth and Bunbury and the city is an important service and logistics centre for regional mining, fishing, wheat, sheep and tourism industries.”

The sale follows Sentinel’s recent move to reduce its retail footprint.

Over the past 12 months the company has sold two assets; City West Plaza at Sunshine in Melbourne for $39 million, and the Riverdale Shopping Centre, located in Dubbo New South Wales, for $20.17 million.

“Retail made up of 61.34 per cent of the Sentinel portfolio in June, 2015, but this has reduced to 28.1 per cent of the portfolio by February, 2021,” Mr Ebert said.

A company spokesperson told Business News the group still owned several retail assets and had been investing more in North Queensland, particularly into industrial properties in Mackay and Townsville.

Sentinel was established in 2010 and has a more than $1 billion national portfolio of more than 50 retail, industrial, office, land, tourism infrastructure and agribusiness assets.

The group has one remaining asset in WA, the Port Hedland Boulevard Shopping Centre, which it paid $17.6 million for in 2016.