New plans for twin 22-storey residential towers in Newcastle West suggest developers’ confidence in the city’s apartment market remains strong in the face of weakening property prices.
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A syndicate of local developers is working on concept plans for the unit towers on the site of the Proski store, Newcastle Leagues Club, Musos Corner and an ANZ bank branch.
The proposed $80 million development would deliver about 200 more apartments onto Newcastle’s burgeoning high-rise market.
Indeed, the development site on the corner of King and National Park streets is next door to where the Verve apartments, soon to be the city’s tallest residential buildings, are under construction.
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The latest 66-metre development would match Verve’s height, the maximum allowable in that part of Newcastle, though Doma Group’s proposed 30-storey towers on the site of the Store building in Hunter Street west are poised to eclipse both.
A spokesman for the syndicate, Newcastle auctioneer and property adviser Gavan Reynolds, said the project showed the “geographic epicentre” of the city had moved west to near the Wickham interchange.
The 4500-square metre redevelopment site is between Verve and Core Group’s $140 million vertical seniors village, hotel and office project in King Street. Newcastle City Council plans to move into new offices in Stewart Avenue in early 2020.
“I remember when there was an imaginary line at Darby Street. You wouldn’t build any residential west of Darby – no way,” Mr Reynolds said.
“Then it became Merewether Street, then Auckland Street, and then it’s just gone further and further down.
“The buyers are very accepting now of that part of town.”
The Herald reported this week that Newcastle property prices had fallen 1.9 per cent in the September quarter, the first significant dip in the market in seven years.
But Newcastle unit prices have been relatively stable, falling only 0.2 per cent in the quarter and rising 0.9 per cent this year.
Official figures issued this week show housing approvals fell 9.4 per cent across Australia in August to their lowest level in two years.
But the Hunter executive director of the Housing Industry Association, Craig Jennion, told the Herald that approvals had risen more than 20 per cent in Newcastle in the 12 months to July 31, and much of that growth was due to a jump in apartment approvals.
Mr Reynolds said the “fundamentals” of the Newcastle property market remained strong.
“And if for any reason the market wasn’t there, we just revisit it [the development] again down the road.
“If the question is about the strength and stability of the market at the moment, then we’re approaching it with the utmost confidence.
“We don’t need the prices to go up. Newcastle developers are a bit risk-averse in that sense.”
The syndicate has met with the council’s Urban Design Consultative Group to fine-tune its concept plan for the site.
The Hunter and Central Coast Joint Regional Planning Panel will be the consent authority for the development due to its scale.