Sale of $74m empty Takapuna lakeside site by March 20: ‘All offers considered’ – Colliers

Lakefront’s sole director is Kerry Hitchcock, former managing director of ex-NZX listed NPT, and now involved with the Haven group but he doesn’t want to discuss the sale.

At Takapuna, the agents want expressions of interest for the Lake Pupuke site beside North Shore Hospital by March 20.

The North Shore Canoe Club sits on the property’s waterfront end at 1a Northcote Rd.

Receivers Brendon Gibson and Daniel Stoneman, of Calibre Partners, said Lakeside Investments was incorporated in December 2020 and operated as a property development business.

But defaults on a loan resulted in the financier calling them in in September.

Security holder Lakeside Nominees is controlled by the wealthy Smale family, also of the North Shore.

Lakeside Investments owes lender Lakeside Nominees $76.2m, the Calibre report says.

Inland Revenue was listed as being owed a further $1.04m and trade creditors were owed $663,000 in addition to that.

That resulted in total debts of $77.9m, offset by the Takapuna land, although its value was not stated. Other assets were put in the initial receivers’ report at $6.6m.

Lakeside Investments’ main asset was the 2.2ha of land on Northcote Rd and the company had been working with consultants to get resource consent to develop it, KPMG said.

Yet physical work had not yet started, the receivers said.

In October, Inland Revenue had the High Court at Auckland appoint KPMG’s Kristal Pihama and Leon Bowker as liquidators of the same business.

Their first report said Lakeside had failed to meet its tax obligations, specifically resident withholding tax.

The KPMG accountants said they had tried to schedule a meeting with Hitchcock, but said that was delayed at his request.

KPMG’s report said the land’s book value by last March was only $64.9m. That differed from the council CV.

A shareholder current account had $6.6m in it, giving total assets of about $71m.

But liabilities outstripped assets by $3.6m because the lender was owed an estimated $76m, preferential creditors were owed $1.04m and unsecured creditors a further $662,000.

Known and potentially unsecured creditors were Auckland Council for the resource consenting, A Studio Architects of Point Chevalier, Boffa Miskell, CMW Geosciences, planners Tattico and Newmarket accountants Blackmore Virtue & Owens.

This month, the Herald reported on Kiwi landlords who said Auckland property manager Haven had stopped paying them rental income.

Pukekohe homeowner Alia Fong said Haven Living Management didn’t pay her any income for five months from July to November, although it was taking payment from the tenants. That company’s sole director is Kerry Hitchcock’s son, Alex Hitchcock.

The couple did, however, receive receipts showing money being transferred into their bank account, said expat Fong, who lives in Hong Kong with her partner.

Haven Living also failed to pay rent to some of its other landlord clients.

But the company told the Herald this happened after it adopted a new “management system” six months ago that caused “administration issues”.

Anne Gibson has been the Herald’s property editor for 25 years, written books and covered property extensively here and overseas.