Real estate war breaks out in Sydney’s richest real estate market – the Eastern Suburbs

Amid backroom deals, a challenging market and bitter infighting, war has broken out in Australia’s richest and most competitive real estate market in Sydney’s eastern suburbs.

A real estate war has broken out in Sydney’s richest real estate market – the Eastern Suburbs.

Get set for real estate wars in the east.

Gavin Rubinstein’s plan for a glamorous new Rose Bay HQ was going to ‘step on a few toes’. But it’s now been revealed the Luxe Listings star won’t have Rose Bay all to himself. Ray White Double Bay head honcho Elliott Placks has revealed he’s opening a second office just 300m from Gavin Rubinstein’s new Rose Bay HQ.

“I secured a lease about 12 months ago and we open next week,” Placks told the Wentworth Courier exclusively. “We’re just doing the finishing touches.”

And in the wake of Tuesday’s news that Rubinstein’s TRG office was losing its Ray White branding (but staying within the White family fold), Placks said he wanted to clarify the “parting of ways” — words he’d used at the time — describing Rubinstein’s exit from Ray White Double Bay three years ago.

RELATED:Why Gavin Rubinstein is smiling

Elliott Placks.

He now says: “I chose that point of time for Gavin to leave — it was my decision, made very intentionally.”

In response, Rubinstein said: “He got the jump on a decision I’d already made … I’d already said come the end of the year, I’m going to take my team and leave.”

And regarding Placks opening a Rose Bay office, Rubinstein said: “I wouldn’t mind if he opened up next door.”

Rubinstein and Ray White managing director Dan White on Tuesday revealed that from July 1, TRG will sit alongside other White family boutique businesses that include its hotels division HTL Property; mortgage broker Loan Market, investment and advisory firm White & Partners and insurance broker Concierge.

The move was to accommodate Rubinstein’s expansion plans — to keep both his existing TRG Queen St, Woollahra office and open his glamorous new Rose Bay HQ.

Both Placks and Randall Kemp, Rubinstein’s Ray White Woollahra stablemate who operated around the corner from TRG in Moncur St, cautiously welcomed the branding change for Rubinstein’s office.

Kemp said: “We’ve been in talks for a long time over this … I think it’s a solution; whether it’s a good one or not, time will tell.”

Kemp also said it had always been Rubinstein’s intention to open an office in Rose Bay.

“That makes more sense for him,” he said.

TRG team: Zac Rabin, Cae Thomas, Remi Lindsay, Evan Williams, Gavin Rubinstein, Shani Asadon, Oliver Lavers, Patrick Cosgrove.

“And I think that was going to step on a few toes, because Ray White Double Bay has had market share there for many years.”

Placks, boss of the office where Rubinstein started as an assistant, was with the business for a decade and became their top performing agent, said: “I’m happy.”

“I think it will give better clarity to the marketplace between Gavin’s business and Ray White Double Bay.

“Because Gavin had been in my business up until 2019, there had been some confusion.”

When asked to explain his reasoning for wanting Rubinstein out of his business, Placks said:

“We were not aligned in our views and I thought for both of us to grow, that his exit would inevitably benefit both our businesses.

DAILY TELEGRAPH – 12 MAY, 2022. Ray White Woollahra Paddington real estate agent Randall Kemp and his assistant Sophie Nazarenko. Picture: Toby Zerna

“I think that Gavin has always been a competitor and Ray White TRG has always been a competitor and things aren’t changing.”

Rubinstein’s viewpoint on the chain of events that occurred is: “I’d previously called a meeting with him and said the value I was getting as an agent in the business was not in line with the fee I was paying him.

“I’d already said come the end of the year, I’m going to take my team and leave.”

Placks added that since he’d taken over the 40-year-old Ray White Double Bay office, his market share had continued to grow with a 23 per cent market share in his core suburbs.

He said that the opening of the new office, which will service both developments and residential sales, was later than expected due to construction delays.

“With our off-the-plan business, we’ve got nine projects on the go and we’re going to have the most up-to-date technology to service those projects.

“And even more exciting is the new Double Bay flagship office … we’re knocking down the existing building to rebuild a five-level building, starting construction in early July.”