Leipzig Australia to start work on $20m industrial estate in Angle Vale

Local group Leipzig Australia will soon start work on a $20m industrial estate in Angle Vale, designed to cater to the surging population in Adelaide’s north.

Local property developer Leipzig Australia will start work on a new $20m industrial estate in Angle Vale in the coming months, designed to cater to the surging population in Adelaide’s north.

Road and infrastructure works will commence in August at the 7.5ha site on Frisby Rd, where 12 of the 17 allotments have been sold, with the remaining five currently on offer to tenants.

A medical clinic, builder showroom, tile centre and civil engineering firm are among buyers in the estate known as Angle Vale Innovation Park.

Leipzig Australia chief executive Frank Vounasis said talks were under way with local and national tenants to occupy the remaining allotments.

“We’ve done a lot of land divisions in the area and this one is an industrial employment zone so I think the timing of it is critical,” he said.

“We’ve had so many houses that have gone up in the area, but not a lot of space for people to run a plumbing shop or a tile shop, so it could be supplementary to the big building boom that’s going on in that area.”

Artist's impression of Angle Vale Innovation Park. Picture: Supplied by Leipzig Australia

Mr Vounasis and business partner Frank Lepore established Leipzig Australia in 2018, and are currently working on several projects across Adelaide and on the Yorke Peninsula.

They include two housing projects in Virginia and Kadina, each comprising of more than 100 residential allotments.

Work on the $22m Virginia Park Estate subdivision will commence in the coming months, while the Kadina project will kick off early next year, and will include traditional housing as well as a childcare centre and specialist disability housing.

Leipzig Australia will also kick off a national expressions of interest campaign later this year, seeking an operator for a quarry site north of Adelaide.

“It’s an old quarry that got shut down,” Mr Vounasis said.

“We’ve established those terms of re-engagement and recommissioning it, and now we’re nearly ready for someone to come in and operate it.”

Mr Vounasis said the boutique nature of his firm enabled it to remain nimble to the fast-changing trends sweeping across property markets.

“We do things small and niche - we’re a very boutique company,” he said.

“We own and buy everything we do. Frank and myself, we buy a block, we do what we need to do and we sell it - it goes through that process where we virtually control the process the whole way through.

“And that gives us the ability to time and price point the market and commit or not commit when we want to, and not have other stakeholders dictate to us what to do.”

While Adelaide’s northern suburbs are currently a hotbed for housing developments, with major projects under way in areas stretching from Walker Corporation’s Riverlea development in Buckland Park to Wel.Co’s Springwood estate in Gawler East, Mr Vounasis said the pipeline of new supply was struggling to keep pace with the demand for new housing.

Add to that the impact of surging interest rates and construction costs, and the state had a serious affordability issue.

Mr Vounasis welcomed stamp duty concessions for first home buyers announced in the recent state budget, but said a longer term overhaul of the local supply chain was also needed to bring back certainty for local builders and developers.

“We struggle to get fixed prices from builders because the local market has no manufacturing, and I think that’s another area government should look at, is bringing back some local manufacturing.”