Subiaco Hotel up for sale after owners retire

SUBIACO Hotel owners Michael and Judy Monaghan have put their historic building up for sale as they prepare to retire.

The North Fremantle husband and wife duo will sell their property for the first time in more than a century.

“I’m 82, I’ve had enough, that’s it, it’s time to retire – if I was 20 years younger I wouldn’t have sold,” Mr Monaghan said.

The couple has run the business for 50 years and seen it change and evolve dramatically.

Mr Monaghan said when he and Judy first purchased the property it was an old suburban pub.

“When we first moved in 1971, Subiaco was a working class suburb – it didn’t have smart shops and restaurants, it was industrial almost everywhere,’ he said.

“It was a typical 1890’s pub and we had a good business, but down the track we decided to change the business and reconfigured everything – we turned it into a gastropub, and put a lot of emphasis in food, wine lists, cleanliness, staff and it worked well.”

Mr Monaghan said Subiaco Hotel could have survived without football at Subiaco Oval.

“It wouldn’t have been that difficult – our reason was purely retirement,” he said.

“I think Subiaco is ready to move again with the new Subiaco Market Pavilion site being developed – it’s a wonderful development and a couple of big businesses will move in the city is moving into a great phase.

“I have great confidence in Subiaco as a suburb and I have confidence that in five years it will be very viable again.”