Swire Properties Expands Pacific Place Portfolio In Hong Kong

HONG KONG – With the renaming of a 24-storey office building along Queen’s Road earlier in December 2022, Swire Properties is expanding its Pacific Place portfolio eastward from Admiralty district into Wan Chai, according to a report from Mingtiandi last week.

Formerly known as 46-56 Queen’s Road East, the office tower was rebranded as Six Pacific Place and is poised to be finished by Q4 2023.

The 218,000 sq ft office building is currently 23 percent pre-let. Among its major tenants are auction house Sotheby’s, which announced earlier this month that it has agreed to lease 4 levels spanning 36,000 sq ft within the commercial property.

Swire Properties also announced recently that it has renamed a neighbouring office building previously known as 28 Hennessy Road as Five Pacific Place. The two commercial properties will be linked at their lower levels, and a spokesperson from the developer told Mingtiandi that work to build a joint podium for the two office buildings is expected to be completed by the summer of 2023.

“We intend to expand our core portfolio at Pacific Place over the next decade in accordance with our HK$100 billion investment plan,” said Swire Properties’ Director of office Don Taylor in the announcement.

“This eastward expansion of our Pacific Place portfolio is timely, given Admiralty’s importance in what is likely to become the new core of greater Central, with its enhanced MTR connectivity across districts,” he added.

Moreover, Six Pacific Place will be well connected to Pacific Place portfolio’s other parts via a planned extension of the existing Three Pacific Place underground pedestrian link. Notably, it will be connected to Three Pacific Place, the Pacific Place Mall, and the Starstreet Precinct, a retail and residential precinct in Wan Chai. The subterranean pedestrian link will also directly link Six Pacific Place to the Admiralty MTR Station.

At present, average monthly asking office rents in Admiralty district fell to HK$51.40 psf. Asking rents for office space in the area have plunged by 38 percent since Q4 2018, noted CBRE Hong Kong’s Head of office services Ada Fung.

Meanwhile, CHFT Advisory and Appraisal’s Senior Director Alex Leung revealed that average asking office rents in Wan Chai have fallen to HK$63 psf, which translates to a 25 percent drop in the last 4 years.

Over the same period, Leung shared that the Grade A office vacancy rate in Central and Admiralty increased from just 2 percent to around 8 to 9 percent, while that in Wan Chai and Causeway Bay rose from 2 percent to about 10 percent.