Geocon to release 'granny flat' apartments in Woden's Grand Central Towers

Canberra developer Geocon is releasing a new apartment configuration in what is said to be a first for the ACT market.

Two units with two bedrooms will also feature a self-contained studio apartment in Woden’s Grand Central Tower development.

The homes will share an entranceway but will have separate keys for the two-bedroom unit and the studio apartment.

A spokesman for Geocon said it was targeted towards both investors and those who had “semi-dependents” in their families, such as grandparents or teenagers.

It is said to be a first for the Canberra market although this cannot be confirmed with all certainty.

Grand Central Towers development manager Alex Glover said the inspiration for the floor plans came from a similar configuration they had in their hotels.

“We’ve got a couple of rooms like it in some of our hotels, so a dual key room,” she said.

“We were in talks with the planning authority and they want to see diversity in the unit mix, mostly looking at three-bedroom units which target a specific budget – usually a downsizer.” 

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The apartments will be single-titled, meaning an owner will only be required to pay one set of rates and one instance of stamp duty.

While the market is starting to preference more diverse and bigger units, Ms Glover say three-bedrooms are not a great seller so Geocon wanted to figure out a way to diversify larger offerings.

The developer will be releasing only two units with this configuration, but Ms Glover said they were open to offering more if it was well received by the market.

“We’re definitely open to doing it more and we’re really open to working with buyers of bigger units to help personalise them in whatever way within reason,” she said.

“We’re just trying to diversify our offering … it’s not just one of three choices in one development, and [we] and other developers are more open to tailoring units to what purchasers want.”

The $200 million Grand Central Towers development is a joint venture with Zapari, and will feature 430 apartments spanning across two towers of 18 and 26 storeys. It is located at the site of the former Medibank building near the Woden bus interchange.

The two apartments are priced from $930,000 to $935,000, and will feature on floors 15 and 16 of the 26-storey tower.

It comes as this week Chief Minister Andrew Barr suggested a body similar to that of the City Renewal Authority could be developed to help with the transformation of Woden. 

The City Renewal Authority was tasked with the role of revitalising a 450-hectare precinct spanning Dickson, Braddon, Haig Park and Civic. Last year the authority set a target for more three-bedroom apartments in the precinct.