Abandoned Amora Hotel has new owners

Wednesday, 17 July 2024

There is hope for another of Wellington’s abandoned eyesores, the long-empty Amora Hotel, after a change of ownership.

Property records show the site was transferred to Precinct Properties in January 2023; the Auckland-based developers were behind the high end Commercial Bay in downtown Auckland, and Wynyard Quarter.

Precinct Properties was recently named by Wellington City Council as the preferred developer for Civic Square.

The Post understands the deal between Precinct and Primeproperty was not as straightforward as a sale, with sources describing it as “incredibly complicated”. While on paper it looked like the site had been sold to Precinct, the development deal involved multiple stages and conditions.

Councillor John Apanowicz said he was aware that Primeproperty Group, Eyal Aharoni’s property development company, was collaborating with Precinct Properties on the Amora.

A similar deal had been made at 61 Molesworth Street, where Precinct Properties was now developing a large office building in collaboration with Primeproperty. The Auckland company was also the owner of the land on paper, through a limited partnership. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade had signed on as a tenant for the building, which was scheduled to open in 2025. The Metservice is also reportedly planning to relocate there.

“I'm perfectly optimistic that all these sites will will be developed,” said Apanowicz.

“And I'm also perfectly optimistic that the council sites that we are doing ourselves [in Civic Square] and in tandem with Precinct will be completed. This is happening, there is activity.”

The Amora’s abandoned state has been a source of frustration for Wellingtonians and civic leaders; like the controversial Reading Cinemas complex, another earthquake prone eyesore, it occupies prime CBD land that should be ripe for redvelopment.

There are also fresh hopes for the Reading Cinema land on Courtenay Place after its US owners put it on the market this week. The proposed sale follows Wellington City council walking away from a deal to buy the land in a deal worth tens of millions of dollars.

But hope that both sites could finally be redeveloped and the city centre get a desperately needed shot in the arm will be tempered by past assurances.

There were hopes the Amora would have reopened by now with Prime Property suggesting in 2021 it was being refitted as a five star hotel, with strong international interest.

Previous proposals for a supermarket on the Reading Cinema site also came to nothing.

Property transactions did take a lot of time, but within the next decade, that end of town would be looking a lot more lively, Apanowicz said.

The Amora Hotel closed in 2017, with a low earthquake rating and remediation work required following the Kaikōura earthquake.

Primeproperty bought the building after the earthquake damage, in 2018. But the title has since transferred to Precinct, in January 2023, with a recorded sale price of $15m.

Jason Dunn, the residential development manager, said as far as he knew Primeproperty was still in charge of developing the Amora. He had not heard about the property transfer.

“Our intention is to reinstate that as a hotel … It’s been gutted, all the floors have been x-rayed and so on to see what’s going on with the steel and anything for structural integrity.

“But we can’t do anything with the Amora until we jack up the James Smith car parking building at the back, because that building fell against it.”

The first priority was therefore strengthening the car park behind the hotel which was a large part of the earthquake safety problem. That work had already started and would be done by early 2026, Dunn said.

Dunn was unaware of any deal with Precinct Properties over the Amora but said he was aware that the company had a joint venture with Primeproperty to develop 61 Molesworth.

Eyal Aharoni, Primeproperty Group’s chief executive, was out of the country and did not respond to The Post’s inquiries. Precinct Properties could not respond to a request for comment before deadline.