By Andrew Starke
Queensland-based diversified property developer Consolidated Properties Group (CPG) has announced ambitious plans to acquire pubs and hotels struggling with debt.
The group has launched a new dedicated hotel management arm, Consolidated Hotel Group, to drive its acquisition programme.
The move is part of a strategy to internalise CPG’s previously outsourced hotel management operations and to provide a new hotel aggregation vehicle for the group.
CPG managing director, Don O’Rorke, said the Australian hotel industry is currently in a reconsolidation phase following the break-up of several major hotel portfolios created before the global financial crisis.
“Most of these hotel groups, including some that were listed, have gone bust and the properties are now being bought by new owners and operators at much lower prices,” O’Rorke said.
“We think there are some excellent buying opportunities out there at the moment and we are very keen to participate in the new industry consolidation that’s now underway.
“Consolidated Hotel Group has been set up, funded and staffed to allow us to go after those opportunities and take a more aggressive position in the market as both a hotel buyer and operator.“
Consolidated currently owns five hotels in Queensland and northern NSW – the Surfers Rowers bar and restaurant at Surfers Paradise, the Boardwalk Tavern at Hope Island, the Links Restaurant and Bar at Hope Island, the Australian Hotel at Murgon and the Sandbar and Grill at Casuarina Beach in northern NSW.
Management of CPG’s hotels was previously contracted to the independently owned Pub Group but will now be internalised within Consolidated Hotel Group, which will also own the properties.
Pub Group will continue to own and operate two other hotels not connected to Consolidated, The Beach at Cabarita and The Cove at Burleigh.
O’Rorke said Consolidated Properties had achieved its revenue targets for 2009 well ahead of schedule and is viewing the current property market and financial environment as the ideal opportunity to set its work pipeline for the next five years and beyond.
The company was relaunched earlier this year after being bought back from its former listed parent Trinity Group.