Staff reporterDecember 7, 2020
Harry Triguboff has put one of his prized hotels on the market.
The Meriton Group has listed the Meriton Suites in North Ryde, with around $150 million being tipped for the building that is the largest hotel complex in the Macquarie Park area.
The 199 unit block sits near competitors Travelodge, Holiday Inn, the Mercure and the Courtyard by Marriott.
Triguboff told The Australian that he is not getting enough apartment sales - just five last week - while looking to finance the construction of more Meriton apartments.
"If I want to build many units... that is why I'm selling," he said.
"The market is going down.
"Prices have gone down about 10 percent from the peak."
Triguboff however said he expected the market to find a level, noting the number of buyers failing to settle their purchase and the number of dropout, where buyers ask for a contract but do not proceed, had eased.
Jones Lang LaSalle Hotels agents Andrew Langsford and Craig Collins are marketing Meriton Suites North Ryde with expressions of interest set to close February 22.
It is believed Triguboff is considering listing another Meriton owned block, a 59 unit building in Rhodes.
The veteran property developer Harry Triguboff recently said many of his Chinese buyers "can't settle" on their off the plan apartment purchases.
"And everyone thought that the Australian buyer would come in when the prices started coming down – they haven't – I knew they wouldn't."
"It's not bad, it's very bad," developer Harry Triguboff said in response to government taxes and credit restrictions on foreign buyer's residential property acquisitions.
A sharp drop in foreign buyers was detailed in the latest ANZ/Property Council of Australia survey of more than 1700 property professionals from across the industry.
"When we start saying that stamp duty for foreign buyers should be 12 per cent instead of 4 per cent, that is called stupid," Triguboff told The Australian Financial Review.
Triguboff said foreign buyer demand started to soften more than a year ago, with prices now going "lower and lower".
"Many of the Chinese can't settle. So now we have to resell them – there is another problem."
