Soleil Update

Meriton's Soleil building in Adelaide Street, Brisbane, appears to have reached full height. It is tall and skinny. The building is 74 floors, 234 metres, and has 464 apartments. Meriton is not selling the top 10 floors or so, and will rent them out (I suspect on a short term basis).

I have looked at the sales board, and tried to work out the number of apartments for sale. This is my estimate:

Studios - 27 in total, 12 remaining for sale

One bedrooms - 234 in total, 132 remaining for sale

Two bedrooms - 168 in total, 45 remaining for sale

Three bedrooms - 35 in total, 17 remaining for sale

Thus, in total, there are 206 out of 464 remaining for sale, or 44%.

(These numbers assume that the top 10 floors, or 42 apartments, are not for sale.)

So one can conclude that since the launch of the selling campaign for this building in October 2008, 46% of the apartments in the building have sold. At this selling rate, it will take another 2 to 3 years to sell the available unsold apartments in this building. Anyone who buys off-the-plan and needs to sell soon will be competing with the developer selling new stock for some time to come.

The building has some downsides. Having so many apartments, there will always be apartments for sale or rent. The facilities, such as the gym, will have to service a huge number of residents. Image trying to book the 12 seat theatre or the meeting room, when you are competing with 460 other apartments. Also, are there enough elevators? Also, there is no ducted air-conditioning -- there are split system air-conditioning units, with headends in some rooms, and the fan unit located in a service area on the floor.

Example pricing:

• Apt 1802, 1 bed, 51 sqm = $402,000
• Apt 2207, 1 bed, 51 sqm = $426,000
• Apt 2703, 2 bed, 70 sqm = $572,000
• Apt 5701, 2 bed, 80 sqm = $807,000
• Apt 5002, 3 bed, 103 sqm = $852,000

In my view, for this size and quality apartment, the pricing is expensive.