Wharf Wins Another Peak Site With Record Price

A rare residential plot on the Peak was on Tuesday tendered out to a joint venture led by a Wharf (Holdings) subsidiary for HK$7.25 billion, beating analysts’ estimates.

The site at Nos. nine and 11 Mansfield Road has a maximum gross floor area of 145,000 square feet, bringing its price per square foot to a record-setting HK$50,000.

The winning bidder, Active Pursuit, is jointly owned by Wharf Development; tycoon Thomas Lau, who chairs the firm that runs the Sogo Department store in Hong Kong; his sister-in-law and Chinese Estate Holdings executive director Chan Hoi-wan; tycoon Cheung Chung-kiu, as well as Boswell Holdings.

The firm beat out other major players, including CK Asset, Henderson Land, Sun Kung Kai Properties and K Wah International to win the prized site.

Analysts say the tender price reflected developers’ confidence in the luxury residential market, and the property to be built there could go for upwards of HK$90,000 per square foot.

Wharf also won a separate tender in December for a larger, adjacent plot at Mansfield Road for HK$12 billion.

The parcels make up a larger site that was withdrawn from tender in 2018 after bidding offers failed to meet the government’s reserve price.