Darlinghurst, New South Wales-based hospitality fund Redcape Hotel Group has agreed to acquire a portfolio of three hotels and four other assets in New South Wales for 500 million Australian dollars ($347.1 million).
The seller is Alice Springs-based Iris Capital Properties, The Australian reports. The agreement — which includes Redcape acquiring seven properties and also selling two pubs back to Iris — is one of the “largest single freehold hotel transactions in Australian history,” according to the media outlet.
Redcape is part of Sydney-based parent firm MA Financial Group, also known as Moelis Australia, which is publicly listed on the Australian Securities Exchange.
The hotels involved in the transaction are the nine-room Gunyah Hotel, in Lake Macquarie, which has been approved for a further 144 apartments; three-room Sydney Junction, in Newcastle, which has been approved for a further 272 apartments; and 104-room QT Newcastle, a luxury hotel opened in 2022 and operated by EVT. All three hotels are located in New South Wales, Australia's most populated state. The six other properties in the deal are pubs and bars.
The transaction concerns the assets’ freehold models, as well as their operating businesses.
Moving in the opposite direction — from MA Financial and Redcape to Iris Capital — are two pubs, Revesby Pacific Hotel and Crown Hotel Revesby, which despite their names have no hotel rooms.
In June, Redcape acquired from Sun Group the eight-room Frisco Hotel in Woolloomooloo — another property located in New South Wales — according to The Sydney Morning Herald. The guide price on the Frisco Hotel was AU$15 million.