Low sales for prime commercial real estate

Office and retail space that once attracted top dollar have suffered from plummeting buyer interest, with sales down 60 percent for the first half of the year, according to figures released by commercial real estate agents CBRE.

Listed property trusts own more than 80 percent of prime real estate, including office towers, shopping centres and warehouses. Kevin Stanley, executive director of CBRE, says the trusts represented almost a quarter of all sales by this time last year, but had only bought seven percent of properties this year.

“Buyers appear reluctant to commit at this time, uncertain whether prices may fall further on the back of an increasing cost of borrowing,” he says.
Figures are based on properties valued at $5 million or more, and include real estate such as Centro Properties’ $2.6 billion Australian shopping centre portfolio.