• Asset: 5 Martin Place, Sydney CBD (corner of Pitt Street)
• Interest sold: 50 per cent. Cbus Property keeps the other half.
• Price: $394 million, settled off-market
• Yield: 5.75 per cent
• Implied whole-building value: $788 million
• Building: 19 levels, approximately 33,860 sqm of lettable area
• Rate: roughly $23,300 per sqm of lettable area
• Buyer: Mirvac Wholesale Office Fund (MWOF)
• Seller: Cbus Property, on behalf of Cbus Super

The most telling number in this transaction is the comparison with 2024. Cbus bought the same 50 per cent interest from Dexus and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board for $296.2 million at a 6.1 per cent yield, which implied about $592 million for the whole building.

Two years later the half stake has sold for almost $98 million more. The yield has firmed by 35 basis points and the implied building value has risen by close to $200 million. Media analysis of the deal also puts the rate per square metre about 20 per cent above recent Sydney CBD office sales at 135 King Street and 32-36 York Street.

Part of that premium comes from the asset itself. 5 Martin Place sits on Sydney's most recognisable civic and financial address. It combines a restored heritage banking hall with a modern tower above, and buildings like that rarely come to market. But the size of the move also reflects a broader re-rating of the best CBD office stock. Investors who sat out 2023 and 2024 waiting for values to bottom are now competing for a small pool of genuinely prime assets.

5 Martin Place was built in the early twentieth century as a headquarters for the Commonwealth Bank of Australia. It was one of the early large steel-framed commercial buildings in Australia.

Its current form comes from a heritage-led redevelopment by former co-owners Dexus and Cbus Property. That project reconfigured the heritage building, reinstated its original light-well as a full-height atrium, restored the historic Rowe Street laneway and added nine new office levels, cantilevered over the existing structure. The result won the RLB Australian Development of the Year award in 2016. Tenants over the building's life have included Ashurst and Challenger.

The structure matters as much as the address. It shows how heritage CBD fabric can be turned into contemporary, investment-grade office. That point is getting more important as owners of older Sydney and Melbourne buildings weigh refurbishment against redevelopment.

MWOF has been one of the more active office buyers this year. It has raised around $630 million over the past 12 months, including about $200 million recently from institutional investors. 5 Martin Place is part of a wider push into blue-chip office in Australia's two biggest CBDs.

The fund has also exchanged contracts with Cbus to buy a half stake in 171 Collins Street, Melbourne, the global headquarters of BHP. Mirvac fund manager Kit Georgeos described the off-market acquisitions as advancing the fund's strategy of owning institutional-grade assets in the country's strongest office markets.

The thinking behind this is straightforward:

• prime, well-located, highly sustainable buildings keep winning tenants away from secondary stock
• new supply in core CBD precincts is limited and expensive to deliver
• buying a half stake off-market from an aligned co-owner avoids a contested campaign
• buying near the bottom of the cycle sets up both income and capital growth

On the other side, Cbus Property has been steadily reducing its office weighting since the pandemic. It manages 12 buildings worth around $4.5 billion for Cbus Super. Chief executive Chris Kakoufas framed the sales as rebalancing the portfolio, sending capital to the sectors expected to deliver the best long-term returns for members.

Some of that capital is already at work. In August, Cbus bought half shares in two regional shopping centres, one in Queensland and one in Western Australia, from the Lendlease-managed Australian Prime Property Fund Retail, for about $1.3 billion combined.

Cbus is not leaving office altogether. It keeps 50 per cent of 5 Martin Place, and it is close to finishing 435 Bourke Street in Melbourne. That is a $1 billion, 48-level tower with about 60,000 sqm of office space, and the Commonwealth Bank has committed to around 15,000 sqm of it. Its sales are better read as taking profits on assets that have recovered strongly, not as a vote against the sector.

The 5 Martin Place result should not be read as a recovery for all office property. Recent deals show how differently buyers are pricing quality, location and occupancy.

• 380 St Kilda Road, Melbourne sold to OneEast Capital in July for $130 million. It had been tipped to fetch more than $163 million when it was listed late last year. The building was reportedly about 45 per cent vacant, and vacancy along St Kilda Road is above 30 per cent.
• 133 Mary Street, Brisbane CBD sold in September for $81.8 million to Quintessential Equity. It was about two-thirds occupied, and the buyer plans a value-add repositioning.
• A Browning Street office in South Brisbane sold this week for $81.1 million at an 8.4 per cent yield to a Taiwanese health supplements group, its second Queensland purchase this year.

Put side by side, those yields tell the story. A trophy Sydney asset trades in the high fives. Fringe and secondary office with vacancy or leasing risk trades well into the eights, or below hopeful asking prices. The market is paying heavily for certainty and marking down anything that needs work, leasing or capital to compete.

Big CBD deals set the mood for the rest of the market. A firm yield on a well-known building tells lenders, valuers and private investors that capital is flowing back into commercial property. Preliminary CBRE figures put Australian commercial transactions at around $19 billion in the first half of 2026, up 16 per cent on the same period in 2025. Industrial had already beaten its full-year 2025 volume by the end of June.

For developers, owners and agents further down the market, there are some practical lessons:

• Quality is being rewarded. Buildings with strong presentation, good sustainability credentials, amenity and a clear story are getting the competitive tension.
• Secondary assets need a plan. Buyers will pay for repositioning upside, but only when they can see the pathway clearly.
• Off-market is busy. Many of the year's biggest office deals were negotiated directly between aligned parties, so being visible to the right buyers matters more than ever.
• Presentation drives perception. Where a building or project can't be fully experienced yet, because it is being refurbished, repositioned or not built, renders, walkthroughs and campaign websites close the gap between what exists and what a buyer or tenant is being asked to imagine.

Watch for settlement of the 171 Collins Street half stake, which will show whether Melbourne prime is re-rating as quickly as Sydney. Also watch whether other super funds and wholesale managers follow Cbus in recycling office capital into retail and other sectors. And watch whether firming prime yields start to flow through to well-located A-grade buildings just below trophy level.

For now, 5 Martin Place has given the Sydney office market a new benchmark. The best buildings are worth more than they were two years ago, and buyers with capital are prepared to prove it.

• The Urban Developer – Cbus sells into Sydney's office rally as billions shift to retail
• Real Estate Source – Mirvac settles $394m Sydney office deal
• Real Estate Source – Taiwanese supplements giant buys $81m Brisbane office
• Business News Australia – Quintessential snares Brisbane CBD office tower for $81.8m
• Government Architect NSW – 5 Martin Place case study