The Sell: Why Jackie ‘O’ escaped ‘living in Westfield’
Breakfast radio star Jackie ‘O’ Henderson’s autobiography The Whole Truth has revealed the reason for her move from Woollahra to Clovelly.
NSW
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KIIS breakfast radio star Jackie ‘O’ Henderson’s autobiography The Whole Truth has revealed the reason for her move from Woollahra to Clovelly.
Her passion for property comes through the 284 pages, with initial references to living with her then photographer husband Lee Henderson in her “dream home” in Vaucluse, which she aptly references as “the Father of the Bride house”.
They had built on Cambridge Ave after paying $2.7m in 2012.
“We were in our groove with work, and our daughter was flourishing, and that keeps you in place for years,” she wrote.
“You hear a voice in your head saying things aren’t right, and then it goes away, and it comes back again, and goes away again.”
The couple separated in August 2018, after their 15-year marriage, when she moved into an apartment on Bondi Beach, but without their daughter Kitty. The couple sold their five-bedroom house for $6.675m in March 2020.
“Once the Father of the Bride house was finally sold, it was time for me to buy again. And after living in Bondi Beach, where any paparazzi could stand out the front and get a shot of me on my way out the door to work, I now wanted privacy.
“I found a house in Woollahra, a modern recent build at the top of Cooper Park, and it was a fortress.”
It cost $11m in June 2020.
“On one side the trees went miles up – it felt like being in a rainforest, completely cut off from the world – while on the other side it was like concrete ramparts with a gate.
“I was surprised it didn’t have a moat. Inside, this palace was cold marble and stone. It was like living inside a Westfield shopping centre – chilly and soulless.”
It was during the pandemic lockdown that Henderson began consuming codeine tablets, Stilnox and alcohol.
“By myself, at night in particular, it was hell on earth.”
In November 2022 she was whisked off to do the 12-step, month-long program at the Betty Ford Centre in Palm Springs by her best friend Gemma O’Neill.
“I never wanted to go back to the house in Woollahra, so Gemma helped me put it up on the market – privately, so that no one would know I was in this state of upheaval.”
She then needed a rental after her return from California.
“We found one – a gorgeous, airy, week-by-week summer rental by the beach in Clovelly.”
Records show it was an $8000-a-week offering, although the agreed long-term rental rate is unknown.
“It helped that I didn’t have to return to the darkness of Woollahra,” she wrote.
The Edward Street, Woollahra, house sold in January 2023 for just $13m, which reflected disappointing price growth.
Her book debunks reports that snooping paparazzi in the park had driven her out of her forever home.
Henderson then spotted a Gordons Bay knockdown going to March 2023 auction through Alex Phillips at PPD.
“The day of the auction is etched in my memory. Kitty was by my side, and I felt a surge of pride showing her that her mum had achieved her own independence and success to make a lifelong dream come true.”
Its Madeleine Blanchfield-designed rebuild was recently given council approval.
THIS MAY BE LAST CHANCE TO WIN TROPHY HOME FOR 2024
Barda House, the recently completed Bellevue Hill residence, has hit the market in what is likely to be the last of the prestige trophy home offerings before the looming summer break.
The Walter Barda-designed home is the work of BAU, the current Master Builders NSW excellence in housing award winner for master builder of the year.
There are five bedrooms and two offices under its butterfly roof design.
The council development plans were secured in 2019 with amendments made in 2022.
Its decor is a collaboration between interiors consultant Kirsten Bookallil and the vendor, former singer/model/actor turned charity worker Nicky Love Joye, wife of fund manager Chris Joye.
The Victoria Rd house, with views of the Opera House and Bridge, has been listed on a walk-in walk-out basis through Ray White Double Bay agent Ashley Bierman in conjunction with Bradley Pillinger at Pillinger as the family is intending to head overseas next year.
With its $9.24m median, according to PropTrack, Bellevue Hill has been among the most dynamic of prestige markets this year, with fresh whispers of a mystery $80m off-market sale.
It was food blogger Stephanie Conley-Buhre and her venture capitalist husband Oskar Buhre who reportedly topped the all-time sales when their mortgage-free, renovated Victoria Rd Spanish Mission-style residence, Alcooringa, sold in June for about $80m, around $50m up on three years ago.
Conley-Buhre’s $51,000 per square metre deal was accompanied by her $43.5m purchase of nearby Monkton, an Espie Dods-designed home.
The unrenovated Federation mansion Leura, sold for $76m in 2023, held the prior suburb record.
The couple did well on their previous Victoria Rd home, which was bought for $17.1m in 2018 and was sold after renovations for $30m in 2021.
It is currently up for sale at $45m by EverBlu Capital founder Adam Blumenthal and his wife Annabelle Shamir.
MALOUFS BEAT DOWN VALUATION ON PALM BEACH WATERFRONT PROPERTY
Ahoy charter yacht manager Lara Malouf and her father, the former waste industry entrepreneur Ian Malouf, have secured a win against the NSW Valuer General over its excessive land valuation of their Palm Beach beachfront.
The victory knocked the froth off the official $15.9m valuation for Gidget, the family’s updated 1960s Palm Beach-style home on Snapperman Beach.
The Maloufs successfully negotiated the land value down to $14,823,000 after two days of argument before the Land and Environment Court acting commissioner Michael Davidson.
The 613sq m Iluka Road property, with interiors by Melissa Collison to maximise its views over Pittwater, had been given a $14m value in July 2022, which was ramped up to $15.9m in July 2023, which the Valuer General conceded during the court hearing was not a fair value.
Barrister Angus Hannam, briefed by Piper Alderman, represented the Maloufs in their victory.
Marion Carpenter represented the newly appointed Valuer General Sally Dale.
“You’ve got to stand up for your principles,” Ian Malouf told The Australian newspaper after his win.
“They just make up a number and throw it at you, and everyone’s suffering for it, everywhere. It’s a furphy. So you’ve got to stand up – more people should take them on.”
The Maloufs lodged their objection in March this year, with the Valuer General disallowing the objection in April and the court proceedings lodged in June.
“Under s34(3) of the LEC Act, I must dispose of the proceedings in accordance with the parties’ decision,” the judgment advised.
Each party is to pay their own costs of the proceedings, which looked at other property values and sales around Palm Beach.
Valuations are used as the basis for calculating land tax and council rates.
The Barbie-style holiday rental, pulling in $30,000 a week during peak season, cost $18.6m in 2022.
CULINAS PUT ‘CASTLE OF LOVE’ UP FOR SALE
Retired Socceroo-turned-property developer Jason Culina and his interior designer wife, Terri, of Culina Design Group, have listed their latest project at Glenhaven.
It has been listed through Manor Real Estate, who while issuing no price guidance are offering two comparable sales, both in West Pennant Hills.
The comparables are the six-bedroom, four-bathroom home on 2042sq m at 21 Doris Hirst Place, with 554sq m floor space in July for $6.5m, and the 2022 sale of the six-bedroom, five-bathroom house on 2054sq m at 17 Governor Phillip Place, with 780sq m floor space, at $7.8m.
The Culina offering is set on a 2575sq m Binet Way block, which was built in the late 1980s in an English Tudor manor style.
It was once marketed as Chateau d’Amour, and before that it was known as Arundle Manor.
The five-bedroom, six-bathroom home comes complete with a tennis court, pool, guesthouse, gym and triple-garaging.
Its new kitchen comes with double islands in Brazilian quartzite.
They paid $3.85m in 2022, after selling in Denham Court and before that Putney.
Meanwhile, the Glenhaven rumour mill suggests that Nathan Cayless and his wife Erin from The Three Birds have secured an off-market sale.
Their five-bedroom, four-bathroom house on 2118sq m comes with tennis court, pool and triple garaging. They undertook the transformation of their Binet home after paying $2,715,000 in late 2020.
RUSTIC STYLE OVERLOOKING PITTWATER
InStyle Australia editor-in-chief Justine Cullen and her husband, former TV presenter turned producer Hayden Guppy, are selling Sundowner, their Palm Beach home.
It has a $3.9m guide for its November 26 auction.
The early empty nester couple paid $2.02m for the renovated home of interior designer Justine Hugh-Jones in 2019.
There have been just a few tidy additions, including a pizza oven and integrated seating on the decking, which has views over Pittwater.
The five-bedroom Barrenjoey Road home is being marketed by LJ Hooker Palm Beach agent Peter Robinson as a “blend of the rustic allure of a vintage fisherman’s cottage with modern elegance”.
Cullen posted to her 47k Instagram followers on the listing.
“I’m a Cancerian and a hermit crab of the highest degree so home is my happy place, and this one has been the happiest,” Cullen wrote.
“It’s seen Odie learn to walk and pandemic home schooling, the advent of work-from-home, two HSCs, so much music and exactly 73538599 friendly(ish) games of backgammon.”
She said the decision comes as her two eldest children will be leaving home next year.
“We need 1/3 less of a house and I need to not cry every time I see their empty seats at the dinner table.”
CLIFFTOP DEAL IS SIGNED, SEALED
First couple Anthony Albanese and Jodie Haydon have settled their Copacabana clifftop purchase at $4.3 million as joint tenants with a Commonwealth Bank mortgage.
The vendors, health food professionals Stewart and Leanne Smith, had paid $4.65 million in the pandemic push to the regions in 2021.
Albanese has yet to sell his Dulwich Hill investment, which remains on the market at $1.85 million.
TURNING PAGE ON FRAUDSTER
The former Lidcombe home of property developer and convicted fraudster Salim Mehajer has been sold at auction for $3.85 million, having come with $3.9 million hopes.
There were eight buyers for the four-storey Frances St property listed through McGrath’s Ruma Mundi and Kon Stathopoulos, who were appointed by NAB pursuant to its 2011 mortgage.
The 846sq m block cost $565,000 back in 2007.
MATCH MOVES ON TO HATCH
Bachelor couple Jimmy Nicholson and Holly Kingston, who are expectant parents, have listed their North Bondi apartment.
Nicholson bought the two-bedroom Warners Ave apartment for $1.42 million in 2021 shortly after appearing on the ninth season of the now axed Channel 10 dating show.
It has been listed for a November 19 auction with $1.4-1.5m million price guidance.
Got a property news tip? Email jonathan.chancellor@news.com.au
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