Construction of Geocon’s 800 apartment precinct in the Woden Town Centre is set to begin mid-year.
The Geocon build will be among almost 2500 new apartments for Woden across a spate of developments, with some complete and others underway.
Geocon managing director Nick Georgalis said the town centre had the demand for that huge spike in units.
“A couple of thousand in the pipeline would take five to six years to deliver, so the reality is it’s only a few hundred per annum that get released to the market, that is certainly not enough to meet demand,” he said.
The first 271 apartments in Geocon’s Wova development have been released for sale. Mr Georgalis said at least half the apartments would need to go under pre-sale for the project to go ahead.
The 23-storey building, the tallest of the four, will have 271 apartments and 700 square-metres of retail space.
There will be 800 apartments across the four buildings including one, two and three bedrooms.
The project will also include the relocation of the Abode Hotel into the precinct. It is currently located on Bowes Street.
The project was scaled-back in the planning stage due to concerns the buildings would overshadow neighbouring properties.
A one-bedroom unit will set you back up to $460,000, a two-bedroom unit up to $645,00 and a three-bedroom unit up to $1.3 million.
Mr Georgalis said the building would be a “mini-precinct” and likened it to the massive 1200-unit Republic development in Belconnen.
“Putting a building in a town centre is one thing, building a precinct within the town centre adds another level of interest to the market,” he said.
Construction is expected to be complete late 2023.
Construction on Geocon’s Garema Place hotel has been delayed 12-months which Mr Georgalis blamed on the pandemic.
Plans for the 11-storey hotel on Bunda St were approved in January 2020, but Mr Georgalis said construction, initially due to begin at the end of last year, may begin at the end of 2021.
“We aren’t rushing to commence it,” he said.
The project was pushed back due to the pandemic and Geocon becoming “more conservative” on the project which relied on interstate, and international, visitors.
“There’s always demand for property, that can’t be stopped … so we don’t pull the handbrake on that,” he said
“We did see a slow down in visitors last years, there’s no question about that.
“We’re just going through some internal due diligence on how we’re going to sort out branding and what sort of offering it might be.”
There has been thousands of apartments approved and proposed in Woden in recent years.
Doma Group recently redeveloped the Alexander and Albemarle buildings with 180 units and lodged plans last month for a 480-unit precinct at a Melrose Drive site.
Geocon recently completed the 430-apartment complex, Grand Central Towers, opposite the Hellenic Club. Twenty-five apartments are yet to sell.
Zapari also has a high-rise residential development planned for the site on the corner of Brewer Street and Corinna Street, which would include about 400 units.
Brite Developments has also recently proposed incorporating student accommodation into its redevelopment of Lovett Tower.
