CBRE Director Investments, Mark Wizel, has won REA’s Agent of the Year award at the Group’s 2019 AREA Excellence Awards. The award recognised Wizel’s success across several criteria including innovation in marketing, data collation and canvassing methodologies, development of values and team culture, commitment to the community, service to clients and of course sales success.
Earlier this year, Shopping Centre News interviewed Mark Wizel and when asked what advice he would give to someone starting in the industry, he said: “Work hard, never stop listening, never stop learning, always treat people with respect.”
On the sales front Wizel led a team – Asian Services Desk – focusing on major transactions with Asian purchasers from mainland China, Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Macau, with more than $1.8 billion of sales over the past 12 months.
Properties sold included Burwood One Shopping Centre – the largest privately owned shopping centre in Victoria and the first Kmart site in Australia – to a first-time Hong Kong based purchaser for $181.5 million. The $100,000 marketing campaign, devised by Melbourne based creative agency, Nose to Tail, won the AREA Property Campaign of the Year.
Burwood One, sold by Wizel and situated in Melbourne’s growth corridor.
Another notable sale was that of 509 St Kilda Road, Melbourne for a record $163 million – the largest office building transaction in St Kilda Road’s history. The vendor had purchased the property less than four years prior for $84 million, almost doubling their money. The purchaser, another first-time buyer, was from mainland China.
Wizel’s innovative Premium Portfolio Property Auction platform also continued to deliver results over 2019 with a 95% clearance rate and several $20 million plus sales.
His philanthropic work during 2019 included donations to organisations such as Race Against Dementia, Snowdome Foundation, Maddie Riewoldt’s Vision, R U OK? Day and Fight Motor Neurone Disease, totalling more than $100,000.
