Australia: The Victorian planning minister has approved Samma Property Group’s BTR project in Melbourne’s Docklands area.
Samma Property Group plans to build a 31-story residential build-to-rent tower at 194 Lorimer Street in the City of Melbourne’s Docklands area.
The Fender Katsalidis-designed plans include 402 build-to-rent apartments, 202 car parking spaces, and 248 bicycle storage spaces. The project will have 3000sq m of community indoor-outdoor amenities, 115sq m of food and beverage facilities, and 850sq m of community space.
In October 2022, the City of Melbourne received a ministerial referral and determined that it could provide support for the project. Planning officers at the time recommended that affordable housing be set at six per cent of the dwelling mix and that the three-bedroom apartments be increased to 10 per cent of the mix.
It has now received planning approval from the Department of water, environment, land, and planning in Victoria. There will be 26,913 square metres of residential area, 31,078 square metres of a net lettable area in the community, and food and beverage spaces.
The tower will have an end value of $250 million with construction costs for the project estimated at $152 million in October 2022. Samma Property and Brightlight bought the site in November 2021 as part of Samma’s second Designed to Rent initiative. Brightlight will provide $750 million in capital for the initiative after the two’s partnership in, October 2021.
A review of how the project will be managed and maintained in the future was recommended to be included in the project by planning officers in October 2022.
