The eight Chinese property developers to watch emerging across Australia

The eight Chinese property developers to watch emerging across Australia
Jennifer DukeDecember 7, 2020

Chinese developers are making their presence increasingly felt in Australia and it doesn’t seem that they’re set to slow down.

While Sydney and Melbourne has typically been a popular spot for Chinese apartment developers, it appears that larger companies are looking far and wide across Australia’s market for opportunities.

Here are eight you should know about.

Just this week, a $70 million residential tower Pinnacle in South Perth was announced by developer Zone Q as the project that will mark their entry into the Australian market. Zone Q, whose parent company is a privately-owned group with a presence in South China’s apartment market and a focus on Shenzhen, has also earmarked two other Western Australia sites for development.

Zone Q is the Australian arm of mainland Chinese developer JiaHe JianAn Group.

This South Perth, Labouchere Road apartment project will be 20-storeys of luxury dwellings, overlooking Perth Zoo, and will include a $30 million seven-storey commercial tower with retail ground floor.

The entire development, totaling $100 million, will be complete in late-2016. It also marks the tallest tower receiving approval in the City of South Perth in 45 years.

The two lots that form the site for Pinnacle were purchase in late-2013 for $10.7 million, and will soon house the 60 two-bedroom apartments, 40 one-bedroom apartments and two three-bedroom penthouses.

Country Garden, the Hong Kong-listed development company, has recently been named as one of the interested parties in purchasing Harry Triguboff’s Meriton.

Country Garden are the developers behind North Ryde development Ryde Garden that saw 296 sales in six hours of its launch. This was their first Australian development site, which they purchased in late-2013 for $73 million.

They're a high-end focused developer, and Ryde Garden was notable for being part of one of the biggest urban renewal projects in the history of the state.

  • Wanda Group and Ridong Group

The chairman of Dalian Wanda Group is Wang Jianlin – the richest man in China, and recently decided to buy into a Surfers Paradise hotel development site in a joint venture of the $1 billion project.

Known as the Jewel development, it includes 1.13 hectares, set to span three-towers and covers 110 metres of beachfront.

We’ve put Ridong Group in the same entry as Wanda Group as they listed the Broadbeach opportunity seeking equity partners.

Sydney has also reportedly been on the Wanda radar, and for the meantime we’re likely to hear a lot more about Jewel, with construction to start in 2015 and scheduled to be completed in 2018.

Launching a new North Sydney development called Lucent late next month. With a display suite opening this weekend, they’re also behind what is set to be Sydney’s tallest residential tower Greenland Centre.

Greenland Centre, at 115 Bathurst Street and 339 Pitt Street,

The new North Sydney development will include 211 apartments, from studios to three-bedroom residences. Pricing is as yet unavailable, other than studios – which will start from $528,000.
The state-owned Shanghai based group is positioned 87th among the top 500 China enterprises since 1992, and has construction projects in 65 cities in 24 provinces of China.

Their aim is reportedly to enter the Fortune 200 list by 2015.

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  • Harman Global Holdings

This Chinese-backed group has made the list for being one of the few to offer house and land packages, with a particular focus on the north-west suburbs of Sydney, the Hills District.

An $80 million Castle Hill development and a $5 million Kellyville site have both been purchased for house and land packages.

The Australian Financial Review reports that the majority of the purchasers into these house and land estates are Chinese.

They also recently spent $33 million purchasing the Kooindah Waters Residential Golf and Spa Resort on the Central Coast, which is set to remain operating, including a hotel and house and land offerings.

Notably more quiet with their developments, Bridgehill Group hasn’t been any less successful. With their Milsons Point, Arthur Street apartment development – which began construction in December – it was an office block that they have been converting into apartments.

More recently, they spent more than $90 million for an ex-council depot in Zetland. The intention is to built a $500 million apartment development.

They were previously the developers of Azure and Monaco at Rhodes, and are notable for the currently selling Esprit by Bridgehill in Mascot.

  • Starryland Australia

Fuxing Huiyu Real Estate Co Ltd, the 23rd largest publicly-listed company in China, is making waves. Their first Australian foray has been the much-publicised $550 million spend across 11 apartment towers in Sydney’s Parramatta through newly created Starryland Australia.

Promenade Parramatta, their creation, saw the land for the development bought in September last year by Starryland after their June 2013 formation. They are, however, Melbourne-based.

Recently dipping their toes into the residential market, Ausbao is looking to redevelop a Sydney CBD office building into apartments at 286 Sussex Street. In June this year they lodged a development application for a 26-storey creation on the site.

The company, a subsidiary of Beijing Capital Development Holdings, are known for Chinatown’s The Quay, a mixed-use development with 270 apartments. The site had been long dormant due to the effects of the GFC.

Honourable mentions go to Marine Parade Holdings, a wholly owned subsidiary of Chinese-based Sunbano Group, for their $85 million Coolangatta development Sanbano Coolangatta, which their marketeers where calling the "Palazzo Versace of the southern Gold Coast".

Hengyi, an affiliate of Shandong HYI, also narrowly missed our top eight – recently bringing Light House and the William to market, although remaining quiet about their future plans.

Jennifer Duke

Jennifer Duke was a property writer at Property Observer

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