Receivers to sell off Damian Lester’s flagship North Tce site as creditors seek to retain tens of millions in debt

This CBD site has long laid undeveloped despite several multimillion-dollar plans – now receivers have taken control and will sell it off.

Artist’s impression of the 2013 hotel and office block development proposed for the land around the Newmarket Hotel.

Adelaide “carpark king” Damian Lester has lost control of the flagship site in his crumbling property portfolio as creditors ramp up their bid to recover tens of millions of dollars in unpaid debts.

Receivers have been appointed to sell off the landmark carpark and development site that wraps around the historic Newmarket Hotel on the corner of North Tce and West Tce in the city’s northwestern corner.

It comes two months after receivers began a sell-off of 10 retail, industrial and development properties owned by Mr Lester, in what he described at the time as a “restructuring” of his portfolio.

A report prepared by receivers reveals one secured creditor, Bond Finance No 5 Pty Ltd, is owed $66.7m by property-holding companies run by the colourful businessman, while debts owed to other secured and unsecured creditors including the Australian Taxation Office, Revenue SA and Adelaide City Council are not disclosed in the report.

Damian Lester in 2000, offering free parking at his Currie St carpark.

Receiver Andrew McCabe from Sydney-based insolvency firm Wexted Advisors declined to comment.

Damian Lester also proposed building the Lester Hotel on the West Tce site.

Mr Lester has owned the land near the corner of North Tce and West Tce for 20 years and had ambitions to develop it with high-rise office and hotel towers. However several proposals over the years failed to get off the ground.

More recently the site was short-listed as a potential location for a new 14,000sq m laboratory for SA Pathology, but SA Pathology’s move was put on hold last year when the new Labor government committed to a major review of the city’s future hospital and health infrastructure needs.

According to ASIC records, Mr McCabe and his colleague Joseph Hayes were appointed receivers of several of Mr Lester’s companies that own the site on April 21.

The companies own individual parcels of land that were amalgamated by Mr Lester in the early 2000s.

In 2013 the property mogul unveiled ambitious plans for a $150m office and hotel development on the site, comprising two high rise towers on North Tce and West Tce.

View of the site from North Tce. Picture: Google Street View

That was followed in 2015 with plans to build a $32m hotel fronting West Tce.

Both projects failed to get off the ground.

It is understood commercial property agents have been appointed to sell the site, which is expected to hit the market in the coming weeks.

Agents from Savills, Knight Frank and CBRE, who are managing the initial sale of 10 properties within the Lester portfolio, declined to comment.

In 2009, the Federal Court ruled that companies run by Lester had deceived thousands of motorists by issuing bogus fines that resembled official Adelaide City Council tickets at his numerous city parking lots.

Mr Lester, a former lord mayoral candidate, has a colourful history in Adelaide and now spends most of his time on the Gold Coast.