Polycell group buy $22.5m Broadbeach site off Louis Zenonos

A Gold Coast developer couldn’t knock back a $22.5 million offer for his in-demand property.

LOUIS Zenonos, who put his developer hat on five years ago to embark on a luxury boutique tower at Main Beach, has succumbed to a $22.5 million offer too good to refuse.

The entrepreneur’s cashed in an in-demand Broadbeach office building, on a potential tower site, that he’s owned since 2015.

Louis paid $11.86 million for the six-level 16 Queensland Ave property, built in the 80s.

It seems the fully-let building, and its blue-chip site, have been a target for buyers for several months.

Office building at 16 Queensland Ave, Broadbeach. Picture Glenn Hampson

Multiple offers reportedly were waved under the Zenonos nose but he wasn’t a taker.

In fact, it seems one party even offered to take half the building off his hands but also was told ‘no’.

‘No’ changed to yes when Taiwanese buyers from Rochedale, Chiu-Yu Chiu and Chin Ching Hsu, rolled out their juicy offer $22.5 million offer.

The buyers, via their Polycell group, will enjoy a net income of four per cent return.

It’s not known whether the building or the site are the big attraction for Polycell.

The 1161 sqm lot, next to the Sonata tower, is on the edge of the Broadbeach CBD and looks north across parkland.

Office building at 16 Queensland Ave, Broadbeach. Picture Glenn Hampson

Seller Louis at one time might have harboured redevelopment ambitions himself.

Six years ago he bought two units in his tower’s eastern neighbour, Barbados, perhaps with the idea of creating a larger site.

Sixteen years ago the office building’s then owner, a company linked to property agent Harry Kakavas, sought approval to add three floors.

Two years later he lifted his ambitions – to a 22-floor apartment tower with a restaurant at its base.

The GFC intervened, the project didn’t happen, and in 2012 the Kakavas company sold out.

The latest seller, Louis, in 2008 paid $3.5 million for a beach-house at Surfers Paradise tower Platinum on the Beach.

His buy, as the GFC was firing up, was at a $5 million discount to the figure paid by the previous owner.

Louis, when he bought 16 Queensland Ave, also spent $3.1 million on a two-level Albert Ave office block at the rear of the property.

That was sold for $6.07 million in August to Kiwi developer Danny Andrews.

The biggest imprint Louis has had on the Gold Coast landscape has been the development of the SEA tower at Main Beach.

He built the eight-level SEA on an $8.2 million beachfront site and it was already sold out when it started to come out of the ground.

Louis hails from Brisbane where in the late 90s he was heavily into the cafe business.

He went on to invest in the Ezidebit payment system and is believed to have scored tens of millions when he sold his investment into a $305 million buyout by a US group three years ago.

Meanwhile, the sale of 16 Queensland Ave marks a quick and solid return to the commercial property agency business by Mason Kidman, a former CBRE staffer. He’s a new recruit to the GV Property Group and handled the deal with its principal, Antonio Mercuri.