Owners of world’s most expensive office tower The Center say Goldman Sachs got cheap rates and they want tenants who will pay more
Investors in Hong Kong’s The Center have not finalised plans for building, but say new tenants will be easily found
The new owners of The Center, the world’s most expensive office building, have said they want new tenants who will pay higher rents when global investment bank Goldman Sachs’ lease expires in December.
“[Goldman Sachs] is paying rent well below market value,” said Pollyanna Chu Lee Yuet-wah, a co-founder of Kingston Financial Group, who has a 17 per cent stake in the HK$40.2 billion (US$5.15 billion) office tower.
Chu also confirmed that investors in the consortium that has bought the office tower had not yet finalised plans for the building. But, she said, “it is likely we will split the floors, with each investor owning various floors”. Each investor will have their own plans, and Chu said she was considering taking some of her floors for long-term investment purposes and for her own use.
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Goldman is the first big tenant to leave the building following its sale in November last year. Some analysts had suggested it would escape the uncertainty surrounding The Center’s new owners and their plans for the building. But the bank will move its back office from the 73-storey tower in Hong Kong’s Central district to a location in Causeway Bay when its lease expires.