Invesco Real Estate’s Asia Core Fund and Australian financial group, Challenger, are jointly investing in a Melbourne office complex, according to a source.

The partnership is investing AUD430m (€300m) in central Melbourne.

The Invesco fund and Challenger will each have a 50% stake in the property, in Melbourne’s Docklands.

It will be Invesco’s first joint investment with Challenger.

The source told IPE Real Estate that both parties are still in due diligence, and that the transaction is likely to reflect a yield “softer” than 5%.

The deal is expected to close “very soon”, the source said.

Challenger will carry the asset on its balance sheet, the source said, while Invesco’s Asia Core Fund will own its half of the complex, which houses an office tower, retail space and car park.

Ian Schilling, Invesco’s head of Australian real estate, declined to comment.

In another first deal, with AMP Capital last summer, Invesco provided AUD150m of senior debt for a high-rise residential project known as Skytower, currently under development in Brisbane.

Industry sources told IPE Real Estate at the time that the investment was being made on behalf of one of Invesco’s regional opportunity funds.

In recent years, Invesco has been active in Australia, buying an office building in Melbourne from Cromwell Property Group in 2014 for AUD208m.

Its single largest purchase was Centennial Plaza, on the edge of Sydney’s central business district, for AUD305m for the China Investment Corporation (CIC).

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