Pat and Jeff Worboys: Couple’s new Sovereign Islands home inside exclusive enclave.
A socialite, who is the wife of one of the figures behind collapsed Gold Coast group Halifax Investment Services, appears to have moved her updating talents to the Sovereign Islands.
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SOCIALITE Patricia Worboys, wife of one of the figures behind collapsed Gold Coast group Halifax Investment Services, appears to have moved her updating talents to the Sovereign Islands.
She has spent $2.5 million on a house that’s been described as a renovator’s dream.
It sits in the up-market estate’s The Sovereign Mile and has a deep mooring that can take a large boat.
Patricia’s potentially armed herself with a renovation kitty by making a killing on properties in the busy Brisbane Rd strip at Arundel.
She and Jeffrey have been regulars at social events around the Gold Coast, putting in appearances such as at a VIP polo event after the 2019 demise of Halifax.
They were renting at Paradise Waters at the time and Jeffrey, 51, was behind the wheel of a Bentley.
When Halifax went down, the business was described by liquidators as a ‘mess’ and they expected to realise a shortfall on the more than $200 million that investors had placed with the group.
That’s no longer the case, with every likelihood that those investors will come out in front.
Patricia’s renovation talents went on show when she was the driving force behind the transformation of a Paradise Waters property known as the Addams Family house, named after the 1960s TV series.
She bought the Buccaneer Crt Gothic mansion, with its ‘widows walk’ and sharp spires, for $4 million in 2014.
The house, as with her previous and subsequent buys, and her one at Sovereign Islands, was bought in the name Patricia Anne Chiene.
By the time the Worboys renovation formula had been applied, the then 19-year-old house had a virtually new face and more modern interior.
The property was sold for $5.3 million in 2018, six months before the Halifax troubles surfaced.
The new Worboys abode at Sovereign Islands is a double-level home with five bedrooms and was built in the 1990s.
It’s on an east-facing 876 sqm site with a rateable value of $1.5 million – $1 million less than Patricia’s paid for house and land.
The mother of three, between May and September, was in selling mode with a four-property holding with exposure to a busy Brisbane Rd.
She sold three of the properties between March and September for a gross profit of more than $1.8 million and has a buyer in the wings for No. 4.
Her outlay for the three she’s cashed in was a sliver over $2 million, with one bought in 2019 and the others in 2021.
Meanwhile, the picture for Halifax investors has gone from bad, to really bad, to very positive.
An initial expectation of a funds deficit of $19.7 million later blew out to up to $58 million.
Things have changed rapidly and the Halifax liquidators’ latest indication is that investors will back get at least 105 per cent of the money they had with the group in 2018.
One payout to the thousands of investors had been made, another is under way, and a third is close.
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