Bob Robertson.
Unimpressed and annoyed property developer Bob Robertson,
of Wanaka, plans to ''crank up'' his new 1000-lot residential
development near Christchurch, having lost his Pegasus town
development to Todd Property Group.
Todd announced yesterday it had bought the 1700-section
Pegasus development 25km north of Christchurch.
The town, with its 14ha lake, 18-hole golf course and
commercial centre, was developed by Mr Robertson over 10
years and already has 600 inhabitants.
Mr Robertson told the Otago Daily Times yesterday
about the problems he encountered when the Bank of Scotland
International, from which he had borrowed the money to
finance the Pegasus development, got into financial trouble.
The debt was eventually taken over by New Zealand Property
Finance, which Mr Robertson says is a consortium of
Brookfield and Goldman Sachs in Australia.
In recent months, he had worked to refinance the development
in a joint venture with Todd but then ''right at the last
minute, life changed a bit''.
Todd acquired Pegasus town ''and dropped us out of the
equation''.
Mr Robertson said he had secured his own funder, but Todd
''got over the line'' first.
''We are now completely out of Pegasus town and Todd is in."
Mr Robertson estimated he had lost about $10 million but was
the only investor who was involved or was now out of pocket.
''But the real loss is the potential opportunity. It was
nearly finished and the profit in the project will be
something like about $80 to $100 million.
''Most of the work's done. It's just a matter of collections
now, just selling down the last assets. All the development's
basically done. So it's a bit annoying after all that."
He would not divulge what Todd had paid for Pegasus but it
was a ''pretty sizeable number''.
Mr Robertson said he would now ''crank up'' his Ravenswood
development next door to Pegasus.
Development had not yet started although it was zoned in
readiness.
Todd expects to complete development of Pegasus in 2015.
Todd Group managing director Evan Davies said in a statement
yesterday Pegasus was the group's only landholding in the
South Island and represented ''confidence in the strength of
the residential market in Christchurch''.
mark.price@odt.co.nz
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