Charter Hall strengthens its convenience retail portfolio with acquisition of Southport Park Shopping Centre, Gold Coast

Charter Hall Group (Charter Hall) has continued to grow its leading convenience retail portfolio with the acquisition of Southport Park Shopping Centre (Southport Park) in Queensland, for $152.5 million. 

The 19,900sqm shopping centre is located in Southport, the main business hub of the Gold Coast and one of the region’s fastest growing suburbs. 

Its prominent 6.5ha mixed-use zoned corner site fronts major arterials Benowa and Ferry Roads, with excellent connectivity to the Pacific Motorway providing direct access to Brisbane’s CBD, approximately 70km northwest. 

Southport Park is one of only 10 triple supermarket anchored neighbourhood shopping centres in Australia, with Coles, Woolworths and ALDI, along with three mini majors, 40 specialities and a separate ‘village’ centre with 17 office and retail tenancies. It adds to Charter Hall’s existing portfolio of three triple supermarket anchored neighbourhood shopping centres, meaning Charter Hall now owns 40% of these assets, nationally.

Charter Hall Retail CEO, Ben Ellis, said, “Southport Park is a high-quality asset in the heart of the growing Gold Coast. The convenience centre benefits from its triple supermarket anchors and offers future value add opportunities given low site coverage. With strong majors trading performance and attractive net lease structures, it’s expected to deliver accretive returns.

“This acquisition continues the successful growth of our $2.5 billion Charter Hall Convenience Retail Fund, focussed on high-performing neighbourhood shopping centres anchored by non-discretionary retailers. As the leading owner of convenience retail in Australia with a portfolio of $16 billion, we’ve always had high conviction on convenience retail and see it continuing to outperform larger, discretionary retail malls.”

The acquisition was secured off market by the Charter Hall transactions team, negotiated via JLL (Jacob Swan and Ned McKendry) on behalf of JVL Investment Group.