Potts Point: Apartment block on St Neot’s Ave approved for conversion to single mansion

Tenants of a Sydney unit block have moved to make way for a luxury mansion, featuring a rooftop cabana and car park, in plans described as devastating “in the midst of a housing crisis”.

Tenants of 8 St Neot’s have moved out as plans for a luxury mansion are approved.

Nearly a dozen tenants of an inner city unit block have moved out to make way for a single mansion featuring a rooftop cabana and basement car park, with the approved plan described as devastating “in the midst of a housing crisis”.

The 1925 apartment block at 8 St Neot Ave Potts Point, which has seven individual dwellings, will be gutted as part of a $3.15m transformation into a three bedroom home.

The development application, previously revealed by The Saturday Telegraph, was approved in August and its 10 residents have since been sent packing.

Barry Sechos’ previous home, a Vaucluse manor on Black St. Picture: Realestate.com

Planning documents reveal the owner Barry Sechos, an investment banker and director of production company See Saw Films, who paid $11m for the property back in 2022 after downsizing from his Vaucluse manor which sold for a rumoured $29m.

Mr Sechos declined this masthead’s requests for comment.

A former tenant who did not wish to be named, stated she was “heartbroken” at having to leave her home, so the owner could “turn a bolstering community into a single dwelling mansion”.

“It is so disheartening to think that such a beautiful building, called home by 10 residents, would be demolished,” she said.

An artist’s impression of the future mansion. Picture: MHN Design.

Mr Sechos' Vaucluse home reportedly sold for $29m. Picture: RealEstate.com

Similar frustrations were echoed throughout the 120 pages of submissions filed with City of Sydney council in objection to the plans, which have been made publicly available.

A neighbouring architect, who has lived on the same street for nearly 30 years, wrote the “untenable” plans “set a dangerous precedent” which would worsen existing problems.

“As planners and architects, we are ethically and morally charged to improve the cities we live in, to convert seven perfectly amenable apartments into a single luxury deluxe dwelling is simply unconscionable in the midst of a housing crisis,” the neighbour wrote in their filed submission.

Another neighbour wrote: “I wonder why, at a time when Sydney faces a severe housing shortage, seven flats are being sacrificed to make way for one private house?”

The proposal was advertised at the front of the property.

Concerns over ongoing gentrification in the area was also cited in several submissions, with one neighbour warning “the once vibrant community” was being turned into an “enclave for the wealthy”.

When approached for comment, a spokesman for City of Sydney said the application “satisfies the relevant provisions of the applicable legislation”, however added the council had since proposed changes to planning laws to stop luxury developers from shrinking existing housing supply.

An artist’s image of the future mansion. Picture: MHN Design

“Earlier this year council successfully proposed changes to planning rules that would prevent residential development from reducing the existing number of dwellings by more than one dwelling or 15 per cent of dwellings, whichever is the greater,” the spokesman said

“Council received approval from the NSW Government in April 2024 to place these proposed changes on public exhibition.

“However the approval also required council add a ‘savings provision’ that means the new rules cannot be applied retrospectively to applications lodged prior to the change in legislation.

“As this DA was lodged prior to the introduction of these new rules the dwelling retention limit could not be applied.”

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