Max Christmas’ friends remember the Gold Coast business icon

Friends of Gold Coast icon Max Christmas share stories, wisdom and memories of the businessman, giving the inside story of his incredible life as a deal-maker

VETERAN businessman and Gold Coast icon Max Christmas will take over his beloved Surfers Paradise one last time when friends and family hold a public memorial next month.

The 81-year-old real estate agent died last week after suffering a heart attack in his Glitter Strip home on December 18.

Max Christmas on the balcony of one of his buildings surrounded by high rise in Surfers Paradise, Gold Coast. Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen

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Now friends say they’ve contacted council to block off the street in Surfers and take his ashes down to the beach so dozens of mourners can bid farewell.

Mr Christmas’ family held a private funeral ceremony on Christmas Eve.

Now his friends have shared their favourite “quintessential Max” moments with the Bulletin, remembering a man honoured as one of the Gold Coast’s staunchest advocates.

Longtime Surfers Paradise local, nightclub owner Billy James. Picture Glenn Hampson

Billy James (Surfers Paradise Lifesaving Club founder)

“We’d all gone to the Americas Cup in 1983 (and) one of the guys that went along was Peter Lawrence, who bought Sea World. Here’s everyone watching this state of affairs, and yet that’s where Max negotiated the deal with Peter to buy SeaWorld. Even though he was at the Americas Cup, he did a deal. I think at the time it was about $35 million. He never took his eye off the prize. Relentless. Not necessarily the sharpest tool, but relentless, that’s why he was so successful.

I remember one time there was a sales meeting, and they were all talking about why they hadn’t made any sales. And Max got up and said, ‘Look, if you guys are going down the chute, don’t f***ing take me with you.’ That was the end of the meeting.”

LNP MP for Surfers Paradise John-Paul Langbroek Photo Scott Powick Newscorp

John-Paul Langbroek (Surfers Paradise MP)

“One thing I remember is meetings with the forerunner for Surfers Paradise Alliance, and if there was an agenda, Max wouldn’t worry about it, he’d come to the meeting with some sort of idea he wanted to talk about. One of the ideas I remember he was always on about, which I still think of when I drive through Surfers, is he would always talk about people complaining about lack of parking. He’d say, ‘We should put up signs saying how many parks there are available in Bruce Bishop and in central Surfers Paradise’. They’re the sort of things he was always practical about, he just loved Surfers. There was a time when he almost went bust one time and he just went down and sold some of his tenancies to a bunch of investors from Newcastle. He was just a great salesman. That was how he bailed himself out.”

Former Queensland Premier Rob Borbidge. Pic by Richard Gosling

Rob Borbidge (Queensland Premier – 1996-1998)

“Max was always a man who was very free with his suggestions. There was a day when I was Premier and the security desk phoned up to say there was a man in a red Rolls Royce who had arrived and was demanding to see me with a car full of people. I told them to drop the bollards and let him in. I came downstairs to see him and there he was with an entourage full of Chinese people who had decided to bring by unannounced to meet me. We made the arrangements to bring them in, though to this day I am still not sure quite what they actually wanted.”

Soheil Abedian. Photo by Richard Gosling

Soheil Abedian (Sunland Group founder 1983-present)

“I have many funny memories of Max but perhaps the one that stands out most for me comes from when I was building my first house on Benowa’s Cabana Boulevard in the 1980s.

It was the first house in the area which was fully rendered and painted, so I got Max to come and have a look at it and he said to me: “It looks like an office building, not a house. People like houses which are all made of brick.” Ultimately Max asked me to build him a new home. While we were working on it he asked me “ How much are you prepared to pay me?” for it. I didn’t know what to say and asked him what he meant, to which Max responded “You have to pay me something to build my house. It’s going to be what makes you famous.” It turned out Max was actually correct because after I finished that I had Michael Gore ask me to build his resort at Sanctuary Cove and it put Sunland on the market. For my life I will always be grateful for that. Max was a mentor and a friend.”

Richard Fowler. Picture Glenn Hampson

Richard Fowler (longtime Gold Coast radio announcer)

The Gold Coast veteran radio announcer used to have lunch catch ups with Mr Christmas regularly and says he always “loved” hearing his insights into the city property market.

Mr Fowler recalled being the MC for a fundraiser at the Marriott several years ago with former Prime Minister Tony Abbott as guest speaker and Mr Christmas turning up fashionably late: “I went up to the mic and said someone far more important than our keynote speaker has arrived – please be upstanding for Max Christmas who has obviously been wandering up and down Tedder Avenue trying to find someone to have lunch with. Everyone clapped and cheered for him. He laughed, he loved it, he loved getting a bit of kudos.”