The Sell: Skye and David Leckies’ home sale confounds the market
Offloading a $17 million-plus property would usually be the talk of the town in real estate-obsessed Sydney, but society darlings David and Skye Leckie’s home sale has been whisper-quiet.
NSW
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David and Skye Leckie’s $17 million-plus uncharteristically whisper-quiet sale of their Woollahra home heralds a sensible downsizing for the dynamic couple.
The sale, reputedly to the Pagent car dealer family, was guided by Dominique Ogilvie, who has developed a reputation as the Woollahra house whisperer since she quit formally selling real estate in the pricey suburb.
The off-market process, run by an out-of-area agent, has prompted inevitable suggestions a higher price could have been secured.
Leckie, who ran television stations for both Kerry Packer and Kerry Stokes, and his charity cheerleader wife Skye bought the Holdsworth St home in July 2016 for $9 million and then sold their longtime Centennial Park home for $10.5 million.
The recent sale of the three-storey home, with a media room in the basement, didn’t surprise close friends given David Leckie is heading into his 70s.
There’s no word on any city bolthole, but it is unlikely to be the apartment in the Jersey Road, Paddington stables complex bought recently for $2.01 million.
The clue might, however, lie in Skye’s latest job. Skye, who rose to prominence in the late 1980s as the group public relations officer for retailer David Jones, has been back at the old Market St store.
She’s been spruiking its conversion into an up-market apartment complex, known as 111 Castlereagh. Taking a break from her devotion to charity fundraising, the social media influencer has been hired by Cbus Properties to solicit buyer interest from Sydney downsizers in the 101 apartments.
The Leckies retain their 40ha Robertson retreat in the Southern Highlands retreat, Mulberry Farm, along with a Noosa retreat.
MEERS MOVE INTO BARANGAROO
Former Sydney lord mayor Nelson Meers and his wife Carole have emerged as the latest buyers in One Barangaroo. The couple paid $17.5 million for their 235sqm apartment on the 71st floor.
They sold their Buckhurst Ave, Point Piper apartment for $18 million last year through LJ Hooker Double Bay’s Bill Malouf and Margaret Morosi to the Zammit family.
The Meers had paid $16 million in 2017.
Meers, who has hotels at Belmore, Rockdale, Campsie and Hurstville, was the lord mayor between 1978 and 1980.
The Meers’ acquisition ranks among the highest-profile buyers, along with the former Rothschild & Co investment bank chairman Trevor Rowe, who paid $13.5 million for a three-bedroom apartment on level 43 of the 77-level tower.
Luke Hepworth, whose family company supplies personal protective wear and hand sanitisers, paid $9.4 million. Retired bookie Bob Blann paid $41 million when relocating from his Rose Bay apartment.
Zac Altman paid $12.5 million for his 212 sqm apartment on the 62nd floor, while another young entrepreneur, Andrew Raso, spent $11.1 million for his 57th-floor apartment.
Bringelly-based Western Sydney businessman Arnold Vitocco and his wife Irene spent $22 million on their 63rd floor slice, off the plan. And the Upton family from Wahroonga paid $12.5 million.
Southeast Asian-based French retail heir Georges Furone-Defforey paid $12.74 million.
Some $870 million worth of apartments had sold when Crown Resort figures were released in February, with 10 of the 18 buyers so far being of Asian descent.
MENEGUZZI OFFLOADS DARLINGHURST UNIT
Marco Meneguzzi, who has been styling the homes of Sydney’s elite for the past two decades, has sold his Darlinghurst apartment. The interior designer’s two-level property fetched $2,775,000.
It had been listed last June with $2.5 million to $2.55 million hopes, but struggled to sell until the current price boom.
There had been subdued interest from Hermes boss Karin Upton Baker, but she ended up in the Dominion complex elsewhere in Darlinghurst.
Meneguzzi’s apartment has two large balconies that look across terraces towards Kings Cross. He bought the two-bedroom apartment in the City East telephone exchange redevelopment — now known as East Exchange — off the plan in 2011 for $1.15 million, back when developers didn’t customise spaces to suit individual buyer wishes.
So Meneguzzi removed the laundry at the front door of the seventh-floor apartment to make the entrance more spacious.
It is just across the road from the Liverpool St cafe premises leased by Bill Granger that fetched $4.2 million at its midweek auction, with the celebrity chef tenant pinpointed as the mystery underbidder. It last traded in 1999 at $960,000.
The marketing advised a net income $192,397 per annum on fully let basis, from the corner shop, plus income from its seven-room boarding house.
There was a recent five-year lease to Bills, which has been on Liverpool St since its grand communal table design by interiors doyen Brian Kiernan in 1993.
Its last registered lease in 2013 was at $103,000 a year. The premises, called on to the market at $3.75 million, sold to a local Chinese family who inspected it the day prior.
PARKER WAREHOUSE SNAPPED UP
The 1910 Annandale warehouse conversion listed by Qantas Group executive Andrew Parker has been snapped up pre-auction through Ray White Taylor and Partners agents Walter Burfitt-Williams and Brody O’Brien.
They had a $5.5 million guide for its June auction, but raised the price expectations to $6.5 million during its two weeks marketing.
The two-floor warehouse on a 305 sqm holding has 463 sqm internal space, plus 44 sqm external space.
Parker is spending more time in the Southern Highlands, having spent $2.7 million on the Burradoo trophy home Catalina in 2019.
The warehouse last sold in 2018 at $4,2750,000 when The Block television show producer Julian Cress moved to Melbourne.
The inner-city’s latest warehouse offering is a 210 sqm whole floor in the Edwards & Co 1920s Surry Hills tea factory. It has been listed by events director Ignatius Jones with a $1.8 million guide for June 19 auction. The former Pardon Me Boys singer paid $1.05 million in 2013.
In Alexandria, a 1930s Belmont St converted warehouse comes with $2.6 million hopes for its June 5 auction. There is lots of exposed brickwork, polished concrete and original Oregon trusses in the three-bedroom home being sold by Walter Martins and Adrian Balderston.
It was constructed as a brass foundry for Linder & Taylor, then occupied by Belmont Engineering.
By the 1940s Alexandria was the largest industrial district in Australia, and its 3000 buildings known as the Birmingham of Australia.
ANDERSONS SELL SEAFORTH HOME
Paul and Hillary Anderson have sold at Seaforth, a year after his departure from the Ten Network.
Their Ellery Pde Californian bungalow, modernised by James Cooper of Sanctum Design, sold within two weeks of listing for an undisclosed price through Stone Real Estate agent Maria Cassarino.
With Middle Harbour views from the master suite, its 1158 sqm grounds come with sandstone paving and walls, fire pit area, level lawn and saltwater pool.
It was marketed as “a home with personality that has it all – live like a rock star!”. That was a reference to its prior ownership by Noiseworks frontman Jon Stevens, who sold it to the Andersons for $1,526,000 in 2006.
The couple are now hobby farmers at Pearces Creek, set between Nashua and Alstonville in the Ballina district.
They paid $1.72 million last August for the 11ha property with its 500 pecan tree orchard. It had previously traded at $1.2 million in 2010.
COALCLIFF RECORD FOR LYONS’ PURCHASE
Beautopia hair and beauty chain owner Andrew Lyons and his wife Liza are the $4.715 million buyers of the recent record Coalcliff holiday home sale.
It was sold by Leap Legal Software executive chairman Richard Hugo-Hamman through Ray White Helensburgh agents Mattias Samuelsson and Simon Beaufils, who more recently also secured a record $6.3 million Wombarra sale.
The Coalcliff weekender traded in much the same condition other than some decking when $3.35 million was secured by former retailer Mark McInnes in 2017.
The Lyons family have a $14.7 million Bellevue Hill home which was bought in 2019 by former AMP chair Patty Akopiantz and her husband, Justin Punch, the chair of the Australian Renewable Energy Agency.
They bought for $4.95 million in Tamarama on leaving Bellevue Hill, and appear to be upgrading having paid $11.5 million on pricey Gaerloch Ave through Goodyer Real Estate.
ARNOLDS RELOCATE
Veteran property investor Phil Arnold and his wife Michelle accepted a pre-auction offer for their Mosman home.
They commissioned their Burley Katon Halliday-designed home after the Fairfax Rd property cost $3.95 million in 2005.
The four-bedroom, three-bathroom house had been scheduled for auction yesterday, with the couple planning to spend more time at Main Beach where they now maintain two apartments in the Liberty complex.
More than $8 million was mooted, but there has been no price reveal.
The Arnolds sold Karawa, their Hopetoun Ave harbourfront, in 2007, for a then-Mosman record of $22.5 million to the Trivest property developer Albert Bertini.
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