Coogee Bay Hotel up for sale

Sydney’s prized Coogee Bay Hotel has hit the market with a price tag of more than $250 million.

The pub has 30 poker machines, a sports and beach bar, brasserie, and The Garden Restaurant.

It also boasts a 51-room boutique four-star hotel offering Ocean View and pub-style rooms.

A number of interested buyers are lining up to inspect it including pub billionaire Justin Hemmes and other high profile developers.

The hotel known for Selina’s nightclub, ­pokies and ocean views was put on the  market in April by long-term owner  Chris Cheung, managing director of C!inc Hospitality.

The sale is being managed by Jones Lang LaSalle.

It comes at a time when a number of hotel owners are selling off their assets to cash in on the market highs. They include adman John Singleton who sold his Icebergs restaurant in Bondi for $15 million to the O’Brien Group.

Hemmes on the other hand has bought five pubs in the past year and is interested in securing the Coogee Bay Hotel as he already owns the nearby Coogee Pavilion where he undertook a major ­restoration.

But in the race to secure the pubm the developers will be in the box seat because the Coogee Bay Hotel, which sits across from famous Coogee Beach, has great development potential.

The pub is perched on a sprawling beachside site which is one of the best coastal sites in Sydney’s eastern suburbs.

Cheung had previously tried to gain ­approval for apartments there and was criticised for proposing a $150 million upgrade of the beachfront site. The then NSW Labor government and the Randwick City Council knocked back the plans.

In a statement, Cheung said there have been a number of offers to buy the hotel, which was developed in 1873 and is 8 kilometres from the CBD. Cheung said he ­remains committed to the business “as we have ownership of a great asset” but has declined to comment further.

Leon Getler 18th June 2018.