Randal Ashford is renovating Darwin’s CBD one building at a time

A Darwin developer has a plan to upgrade the city’s commercial office space. Read what he’s doing.

Randal Ashford at 43 Cavenagh Street

Architect and developer Randal Ashford is two buildings into a transformation of Darwin’s CBD that he hopes could eventually revitalise the city and reinvigorate its commercial property stock.

Ashford Group Investments, Randal’s development company, is completing refurbishments at the Cavanagh Centre at 43 Cavenagh Street just months after finalising a similar restoration at 82 Smith Street.

Including purchase price, each project will round out at about $5 million a pop.

Developer Randal Ashford in front of the newly refurbished Cavenagh Centre at 43 Cavenagh Street.

But the $10 million committed so far could be just the start for Randal, who sees unlimited opportunity reviving Darwin commercial property sector.

“If anyone out there owns a CBD building and it’s not in their skill set to do a refurbishment, I’m happy to have a chat to them and see if we can team up and work together,” he said.

“I’d like to roll this model out to other property owners and help rebuild Darwin to make it the best city in the world.

A new Fresh Point cafe will open on the ground floor.

“There’d easily be another 10 buildings like this one in town which are owned by families that don’t often part ways with their properties. It would be good to see a bit of a changing of the guard though.”

Built in 1976, the four-storey Cavenagh Centre had been cleared of all but one of its tenants in 2023 after a mould outbreak made the four-storey property virtually uninhabitable.

Ray White real estate, the final remaining tenant, vacated the property last year.

Owned by the Anglican Church, Randal offered to purchase the Cavenagh Centre and secured a license to occupy during the property settlement phase so he could begin renovation work immediately.

Some of the mould at the Cavenagh Centre in February 2024

The building was an eyesore that emitted mould fumes directly across the road from the brand new $250 million Charles Darwin University CBD campus.

“The fundamental issue was water coming through the roof which created water and mould problems throughout the building,” Randal said.

“I went straight to the root of the problem and put on a brand new roof and a brand new stormwater system so the water could escape properly.

Before the renovation at 82 Smith Street.

“I got everything safe again level by level. I removed all the carpet, removed all the mould damaged walls, opened all the windows and got professional mould specialists in to give me a remedy strategy. It took two months to get rid of it all.

“Over the past five months I’ve done a complete refurbishment and upgraded everything from the top down.

“We’ve painted, polished the concrete floors, introduced new airconditioning, LED lights and glazing as well as new walls, new toilets, new bathrooms and new tiles throughout so everything from the top down is pretty much brand new.

82 Smith Street after the renovation.

“As well as that we painted the outside and fixed up all the damaged glazing.

From a vacant, uninhabitable shell 12-months ago, the Cavenagh Centre is bright, shiny and as good as new. Randal is now in the process of securing new tenants, with an education and creative space set to occupy the top level and to complement the university across the road.

He said as well as Northern Accounting, a 24-7 tanning salon and a laundromat, Top End cafe franchise Fresh Point is set to open its first CBD outlet in the 310 sqm ground floor space.

To an extent the Smith Street property provided a template for the Cavenagh Street revamp, with 100kW solar panels fitted to the roof slashing the annual power bill from $140,000 to zero.

“The structure of both the buildings at Cavenagh and Smith streets were in really good condition once the fundamentals were fixed,” Randal said.

“I’ve essentially refurbished the entire Cavenagh building now – there’s new services, a new elevator, new electricity, new everything, so I reckon I’ve extended its life by another 50 years.”

Next up for a facelift is 97 Mitchell Street, home of Capitanos Hotel, which Randal recently bought for $4.5 million.

Originally published as Randal Ashford is renovating Darwin’s CBD one building at a time