The firm put together a 20-strong team composed of experts in 9 practice areas
HopgoodGanim Lawyers has guided the owners of Queensland developer Halcyon on the $620m sale of its business to ASX lister Stockland.
Halcyon focuses on developing lifestyle communities in southeast Queensland, and has established over 1,500 homes after over a decade in business. With the completion of the deal, Stockland snaps up 3,800 sites across 13 Halcyon communities, HopgoodGanim said.
Three of these communities are in the planning stage, four are currently in development and six have been completed.
“Land lease communities deliver attractive returns as the demand for high quality, affordable housing solutions grows,” Stockland CEO Tarun Gupta said in a statement published by The Urban Developer. “This demand is driven by Australia's ageing population and baby boomers reaching retirement age.”
Gupta confirmed that adding Halcyon to its land lease communities portfolio will expand its reach to 7,800 sites. Halcyon’s lifestyle community development business would operate independently of Stockland’s existing retirement holdings and land bank.
Halcyon joint managing director Paul Melville described the sale as “a very large and complicated transaction,” and praised the HopgoodGanim team for its handling of the deal in a “very commercial, efficient and cost-effective way.”
The firm said that the team helped Halcyon to conduct a full vendor legal due diligence, oversee the bid process, negotiate the transaction documents and implement completion.
Partner Luke Mountford took point on the 20-strong team, which was composed of experts across 9 practice areas. He worked alongside associate Sarah Judge and manufactured home park specialist Anthony Pitt.
“We were fortunate to have had a long association with HopgoodGanim, which meant that we were able to work on this transaction with advisors who had an intimate knowledge of our business and the industry in which it operates,” Melville said. “The collaborative approach adopted by HopgoodGanim allowed us to draw the strengths of each of the members of the team – from Luke’s commercial acumen to Anthony’s expertise as one of the recognised experts in manufactured home park law in Queensland.”
Mountford congratulated Halcyon on the sale.
“HopgoodGanim Lawyers is proud to have advised the owners of Halcyon for many years and it has been a pleasure working with the entire Halcyon team throughout the course of this significant transaction,” he said. “We congratulate all involved on successful completion of the deal and look forward to watching the Halcyon brand continue to grow and prosper into the future.”
