Pamfleet Sells Hong Kong Office Building for $217M After Leasing to naked Hub

Andrew Moore’s Pamfleet is reported to have sold the Bonham Circus office building in Sheung Wan for HK$1.7 billion ($217 million), making a profit of HK$700 million ($89 million) in less than two years.

The buyer, which market sources indicate is a consortium of Hong Kong and Macau buyers, are paying the equivalent of HK$19,000 ($2,429) per square foot for the small footprint commercial tower. Sources at Pamfleet declined to comment on the reported transaction.

The real estate investment firm purchased the building formerly known as EIB Centre, in August 2016, for HK$1 billion ($128 million). The 29-storey building is located just one metro stop west of the city’s Central business hub and has a gross floor area of 88,000 square feet (8,175 square metres).

Pamfleet Buys, Fixes and Flips in Sheung Wan

Since purchasing the 1999-vintage building, Pamfleet renovated the exterior and lobby of the property. The firm has also overhauled the asset’s tenant mix by securing co-working operator naked Hub as the project’s anchor tenant, occupying the lower half of the tower.

Pamfleet’s profitable alliance with naked Hub follows a trend of developers cooperating with co-working operators on renovation and redevelopment projects. Hong Kong-based private equity shop Phoenix Property Investors signed up WeWork as a key tenant at its Tower 535 commercial complex on Jaffe Road in Causeway Bay soon after completing redevelopment of that project in 2016.

In Shanghai, Warburg Pincus-invested Kailong REI earned RMB 500 million ($74 million) in just eighteen months from by flipping an 11,000 square metre building on Yunnan Lu in Huangpu district, after leasing the whole building to WeWork for a reported RMB 9 per square metre per day.

Renovation Specialist Keeps Doing Hong Kong Deals

Known for its value-added real estate investments, Pamfleet in July leased 16 floors in Bonham Circus to co-working provider naked Hub as the Shanghai-based firm’s first centre in Hong Kong. With the co-working space provider’s arrival the building was said to be nearly fully occupied.

Just last month the real estate investment firm, with backing privately held UK investment firm Chelsfield, bought a shopping centre in Hong Kong’s North Point for HK$2 billion ($256 million) from Li Ka-shing’s Fortune REIT.