The deal, for the headquarters of another real estate group, Spec Property, comes 18 months after Zig Inge paid $4.4 million for Prahran's former Flying Duck Hotel, which was offered with vacant possession.

Zig Inge's hospitality interests including the Flinders Hotel on the Mornington Peninsula and Camberwell's Rivoli theatre – potentially spelling a new future for 57 Balmain Street, should Spec Property vacate. The popular Cherry Tree Hotel is across the road.

Representatives from both parties were unavailable to comment about the deal or building's future occupancy. Zig Inge is speculated to be paying more than $12 million for the asset, almost twice the price Spec Property paid four years ago.

In 2010, Zig Inge made headlines flipping a residential property at 39 St Georges Road, Toorak, for $24 million – a year after buying it from members of the Baillieu family for $14.8 million.

The Rosella complex was developed from 1905 on part of the former Cremorne Gardens amusement park site. The preserving company vacated the complex in the early 1980s, allowing historic buildings to be repurposed, many as offices.

$17m in Malvern East deals

Two Malvern East development sites have sold in deals totalling almost $17 million.

In the biggest transaction, a consortium of local and interstate investors is paying $9.7 million for a former Sheridan Hall aged care home, at 16-24 Castlebar Road, opposite a Chadstone Shopping Centre open-air car park.

The 3884 square metre parcel, on the south-west corner of Arcadia Avenue, includes a sprawling low-rise building with wings. It was marketed by agency Fletchers for its potential to make way for a multi-level structure. Across the road, Chadstone Shopping Centre manager Vicinity Centres has almost finished building a hotel and 10-level office.

Meanwhile, another investor with faith in the south-east suburb has spent $6.75 million on a 1680-square-metre block, after a campaign by Allard & Shelton's Joseph Walton. The land sold to a Malaysian developer at a rate of almost $4000 per square metre.

In June, private developer Little Projects was permitted to replace the former Dairy Bell ice creamery in the suburb's Waverley Road with a premium residential complex.

The block, on the corner of Belgrave Roads, is now earmarked for more than 130 flats after Little Projects bought it from interests associated with the ice cream business in early 2015.

Dairy Bell had operated from the Malvern East property for some 45 years.

Stamoulis selling another slice of Symex

Property developer Harry Stamoulis is selling down another piece of the former Symex soap factory, which he bought for $25 million in 2013, immediately before a surprise government rezoning set local land values booming.

The historic brick building on the corner of Ingles and Woodruff streets, Port Melbourne, could sell for about $10 million after a campaign by agency Dawkins Occhuito.

The listing comes eight months after it was reported Stamoulis pocketed $5 million selling another piece of the site, an unrenovated art deco office at 164 Ingles Street, to producers of TV show The Block. A renovation-based reality series restoring that building into luxury apartments is airing.

Mr Stamoulis, meanwhile, has developed more than 250 townhouses on the balance of the Port Melbourne factory he could raze.

The builder and investor has recently moved into a $70 million-plus St Georges Road, Toorak, mansion, which has taken several years to build. On the last day of 2015, he sold the Vogue Shopping Plaza in South Yarra, for $92 million.

Developer snares Keysborough block

A six-hectare tract of Industrial 1-zoned Keysborough land has sold to a developer for $5.8 million.

At 295-321 Perry Road, about 30 kilometres south-east of the CBD and near major arterials EastLink, Monash Freeway and Nepean Highway, the property includes two family-sized homes surrounded by rolling lawns.

Andrew Thorburn and Andrew Waddell from Gross Waddell with Tanya Nguyen from Ray White Noble Park were the marketing agents. "The market is short of quality industrial stock that provides for substantial development (STCA)," Mr Thorburn said, adding the Perry Road holding provided exactly that opportunity, reflecting a value of $97 per square metre of land.

Riverside Hawthorn block fetches $5.85m from developer

A riverside block of land in ritzy Hawthorn sold last week for $5.85 million, nearly $2 million more than initial price expectations.

The 1180-square-metre property at 6-8 Morang Road was marketed to medium-density developers (including the eventual buyer, a townhouse builder), and passive investors.

The offering includes a double-storey, 870-square-metre office with the potential to earn annual rent of $200,000, As such, the property, which also abuts the Morang Road Reserve, exchanged on a yield of 3.4 per cent.  When it was recently listed for sale, agents Michael Taylor and Tom Maule of Teska Carson, were expecting an approximate 5 per cent return.

Another farm sells for multimillions

Another family is pocketing tens of millions of dollars after selling a former farm in Melbourne's west.

The 85-hectare Tarneit, parcel, is exchanging to a consortium of investors, including interests associated with Adept Developments, whose portfolio includes projects in Geelong.

Just over half the 85-87 Sewells Road block can be replaced with housing – the balance covered by a Rural Conservation zoning.

The speculated $45 million sale price attaches a near seven-figure value to each hectare. First National Commercial Westwood selling agent Bob Westwood marketed the site, about 25 kilometres from town.

Earlier this week, another family sold a Wyndham Vale sheep farm to developers for $95 million. That 115-hectare block, reportedly bought for about $60,000 in the 1970s, was not offered with any residential redevelopment permissions.

The new owner, listed Singaporean giant Frasers Property (known pre-2014 as Australand), is planning low-density housing estate for the Black Forest Road site, about 30 kilometres from the city.

In one of the biggest property deals of its type, in 2010, Stockland agreed to pay two sisters $300 million for the family's 1121-hectare Lockerbie sheep station in Kalkallo, about 35 kilometres north of the CBD.

Correction

An item in last week's Capital Gain incorrectly stated that a property at 395 Albert Street in Brunswick had sold. The item also stated the property was offered with a "planning scheme" for an eight-level apartment. The site has no planning permit but an amendment to the area's planning scheme is under way.

Email: marcpallisco@gmail.com

Twitter: @marcpallisco