The Australian Hotel in Ballina has been sold to Jackson Quinn, a former CUB Business Development Executive.
Local publican Patrick Henderson sold the hotel to Quinn for $4 million. Henderson had owned the hotel since 2013. The transaction was overseen by Blake Edwards and Glenn Price of HTL Property.
Quinn has long-term experience in the hospitality and liquor industries in the Northern Beaches area of Sydney, with his career including a two-year stint as manager of the newly sold Harbord Beach Hotel, before spending almost a decade as a business development executive for CUB. He and his wife decided to relocate their young family for a different lifestyle.
“After 11 years in hospitality working for large-format venues and a leading brewery, we both knew we were looking to escape the Sydney rat race and, with family nearby, Ballina is just a beautiful place with so much potential.
“I have worked at pubs before that were at the heart of the community, and The Aussie with its location, size and multiple offerings, can be that pub for Ballina,” stated Quinn.
The hotel is located on Ballina’s main street on a large corner position, and features a bar, bistro, 18 accommodation rooms, 12 gaming machines and a large outdoor beer garden. Ballina is a coastal town in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales, and is home to the Ballina/Byron Bay airport.
“We always find that any listing around the Northern Rivers system of NSW attracts enormous interest and competitive bidding from potential purchasers; the Australian Hotel was no different,” stated Edwards.
“The purchaser identified strong upside in the business, especially in gaming, which served to compel it to buy the hotel.”
HTL Property’s national director, Dan Dragicevich said the area has been a focus for the business of late.
“We’ve applied a concerted and strategic focus to the Northern NSW Coastal Region in the past 18 months, and have been rewarded by our participation in 10 sales totalling in excess of $120m during this time.”