Over 50s lifestyle resort owners Living Gems and GemLife are seeking a reported more than $1 billion investor to cement themselves as the largest land lease operator in Australia.

“I can confirm that both Living Gems and GemLife are jointly conducting a strategic review of both businesses for the purposes of merging together and bringing on board a sizeable strategic investor who is willing to share in the growth story of what will be Australia’s largest pure play land lease operator, under the GemLife moniker,” said CEO Adrian Puljich.

GemLife, founded in 2016, has received financial backing from Thakral Capital, a financial investor and subsidiary of Singapore’s Thakral Corporation.

In its financial report for FY2021, Thakral Corp said “GemLife continues to do exceptionally well - benefiting from its product, location advantages, goodwill and public awareness generated by its quality product and facilities. Management’s exceptional efforts to help residents to cope with the (COVID-19) pandemic was well received by residents.”

We reported the merger plan of Living Gems and GemLife in February and the Queensland-based family business has retained investment banker Highbury Partnership for the third party investor search.

GemLife has established, under construction and in pipeline more than 11,000 land lease homes across 43 locations across Queensland, NSW and Victoria, which makes its potential about twice the size of the $1.86 billion ASX-listed Lifestyle Communities.

Sources told the Financial Review the Puljich family is looking at offering a “material stake” to big Australian listed real estate groups and others circling over-50s estate owners, to realise some of their investment and help with succession planning.

Major players who may be suitors include ASX-listed Stockland, who wants to be the country’s largest land lease developer within just three years, or Mirvac, which has said it will announce its first land lease projects in November.