The Sell: Armytage retreat languishes as summer selling season wraps up
Former Sunrise co-host Samantha Armytage has yet to sell her NSW South Coast holiday retreat, as the summer selling season wraps up. But she’s not alone, reports The Sell.
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Former Sunrise co-host Samantha Armytage has yet to sell her NSW South Coast holiday retreat, as the summer selling season wraps up.
But she’s not alone, with the tide having gone out on beachside-buying enthusiasm, in part because of rising land taxes.
Armytage listed her Hyams Beach holiday retreat in early December and maintained a steady $3.2m price guide.
Southern Highlands-based Armytage leases it out as a holiday rental, securing up to $1200 a night for the three-bedroom, two-bathroom house.
She bought the house — set on 658sq m — for $1.765m in 2018, and then renovated it with a new roof and interiors.
Craig McIntosh, of The Holidays Collection, is marketing the property which had its valuation jump to $2.3m in 2021 from $1.43m in 2020 as the Covid-19 pandemic boom conditions took off.
Multi-millionaire yacht owner Jim Cooney, who is the chairman of TCI Renewables, has also yet to sell his pricier beachfront retreat set on Jervis Bay.
It is priced at $7m, so even a discounted sale will easily smash the $4.8m location record.
Meanwhile, Mimosa, a nearby five-bedroom home, remains listed through Christina Pincevic, of CMP Real Estate.
The Cyrus St property has been on the market for 379 days, according to CoreLogic, with the marketing now advising the vendor as “motivated”. It had initial guidance of $5.5m to $6m.
The NSW North Coast has some of the highest number of on-and-off beach listings, especially at Sapphire Beach.
The clifftop retreat of former coal baron Nathan Tinkler was first listed in 2021.
The 15-bedroom Coachmans Close mansion had sale documents exchanged at $25m in 2023.
However, the Foreign Investment Review Board reputedly rejected the buyer.
It is currently listed at $15.9m.
Other lengthy listings in Sapphire Beach include 6 Beachfront Close, which has been on and off the market since 2018.
In the current campaign, Liapari Beach House has been for sale for 600 days with a $4.3m price guide.
It is listed as a $1000-a-night holiday rental property, with a proven track record of high returns.
SWANS STAR STILL WAITING ON REMODEL APPROVAL
Sydney Swans star, and serial property investor and developer, Luke Parker, and his interior designer wife Kate Lawrence still await development application approval for remodelling the Malabar home they bought for $3.3m in 2022.
It remains under assessment by Randwick Council for its $275,000 reconfiguration and addition of a swimming pool.
Parker, who broke his arm on the eve of the AFL season opener, lodged the Superior Designs application last June.
Parker had previously owned in Malabar previously, paying $2.66m for a five-bedroom home with pool in 2017 which he sold for $3.2m in 2020.
The property-keen couple have developed property with great success on social media and in the real world sales market over recent years. They have done apartments and duplexes mostly in Sydney’s eastern coastal suburbs.
Their property journey has been featured on a video series sponsored by QBE on realestate.com.au called The Building Game.
Flipping three Sydney properties in five years taught the duo that there’s no such thing as a standard easy renovation, with every project posing its own set of obstacles and requiring a detailed game plan to overcome them, their video blog advised.
Parker’s taste for property kicked off in 2013 when the then-20-year-old paid $915,000 for a three-bedroom townhouse in Maroubra having been picked up in the 2010 draft after playing for the Dandenong Stingrays.
It was sold for $1.36m in 2018 with the help of Luke’s carpenter father, after they all lived there together during the renovation.
His return to play is yet to be determined, with the 31-year-old having met with specialists on Friday to determine his future. The midfield star, who announced his engagement to Kate in early 2021, married in late 2022 on Orpheus Island.
GLAM COUPLE LEAVE ONCE UGLY HOME FOR BIGGER DIGS
Luxe Listings Sydney cast member Tammy Soglanich and her Lower North Shore real estate agent husband, James Bennett, have upgraded homes to Bellevue Hill.
The couple have bought a property for $7.2m.
It follows the off-market sale of their Paddington terrace for $4m. The three-level Underwood St terrace with pink front door sold last October with its settlement last month.
The 1890s three-bedroom, one-bathroom terrace had been bought for $1.85m in 2019. Spanning just 110sq m, it had been held in the same family for 60 years before the couple made their first purchase together.
Soglanich, who had been a buyers agent for seven years, described it as the “ugliest terrace” they had seen, being painted red and yellow.
“It looked like tomato sauce and cheese,” she once said. “Quite a nightmare.”
The couple, who shared the home with chihuahua Chloe, undertook a nine-month makeover by architect Tanya Hancock.
Their Rosslyn St, Bellevue Hill, purchase is a four-bedroom three-bathroom house set on 433sq m. The 1985 home – last sold nearly 30 years ago – has the potential to enhance its city skyline outlook from the attic.
The purchase came amid the suburb’s late-2023 boom, which has continued into this year.
Strong February sales resulted in Bell Potter stockbroker Les Owen and wife Sam selling their Trahlee Rd home pre-auction midweek for close to $15m. They had bought the four-level house for $6.5m in 2007.
Earlier in February, a contemporary four-bedroom, three-bathroom Streatfield Rd sold for $12,161,000, having traded at $10.4m last April. The vendors had only repainted, then styled the property and redone the garden in the interim.
GODOLPHIN HOPING FOR HIGH COURT TAX VICTORY
Horseracing empire Godolphin is set to challenge a NSW land-tax ruling in the High Court on Tuesday, seeking a judgment that it engages in primary production and is, therefore, entitled to land-tax concessions.
There was an initial NSW Supreme Court judgment in 2022 that saw Godolphin set to be repaid $1.438m by State Revenue for land tax paid between 2014 and 2019.
This came after Justice Julie Ward ruled its 907ha Kelvinside and 2420ha Woodlands operations met the zero land-tax status of primary production. Godolphin argued that the dominant use of the land was for the maintenance of stallions for the purpose of selling their semen.
The case did not involve Godolphin’s properties at Crown Lodge and Osborne Park, which conduct racing operations and do not qualify as primary production.
The 2022 judgment was, however, overturned in 2023 by the Court of Appeal.
The legal team of Godolphin owner Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum is headed by Bret Walker.
Vincent Cox, the stable’s managing director, has noted its business was different to most commercial thoroughbred breeders who breed foals and sell them as yearlings before they are ready to race. He said Godolphin had a “breed to race, race to breed” model.
The High Court hearing will gather details of Godolphin’s stallion roster, which includes Exceed and Excel, who commanded fees of $132,000 per cover in 2020.
Godolphin gave evidence that in the 2020 covering season it had 11 stallions available at Kelvinside.
Its covering fees had generated $18m in the 2019 breeding season when fees for Exceed and Excel were $88,000 per cover.
ACTOR CLOSES CURTAIN ON BEACH HOME
Ballerina-turned-actor Sheree da Costa has listed her Avalon Beach home.
It has been scheduled for auction on March 20 with McGrath Pittwater agent Adrian Venturi hoping for a $4.8m sale price.
The four-bedroom, three-bathroom Binburra Ave house was built on its 696sq m holding in 2018. It has parquetry floors, coffered ceilings, and bifolds that open to an expansive veranda and outdoor kitchen.
There is a lower-level studio plus a four-car garage with internal access.
The home was masterbuilt five years after its purchase in 2013 for $1,255,000. It has had 1968 page views since its listing on realestate.com.au.
PropTrack puts the four-bedroom home median price up 3.5 per cent at $2,925,000 after 71 sales over the past year.
Da Costa plans to downsize, while staying on the Northern Beaches where she has resided for about four decades.
She was the winner of Best Actress in an Indie Film at the 2023 Cannes World Film Festival for her role in Dancing With My Mother.
Her films in the works include Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, which is set to be released in May, and The Deb, directed by Rebel Wilson and due for release next year.
Da Costa was with the Australian Ballet Company before being enticed to the Sydney Dance Company.
KATE, LUKE WAIT ON SALE
Kate Waterhouse and Luke Ricketson have not yet found a buyer for their Potts Point investment property, which was listed twice with February auction dates.
The Balmoral Beach couple will take $965,000 for the two-bedroom, one-bathroom William St apartment.
The 50sq m apartment, with a balcony, cost $525,000 in 2010. Investors have been advised it could fetch between $950 and $1050 a week in rent.
STUNNER HAS BAY VIEWS
A Drummoyne trophy home on the Bay Run has been scheduled for a March 16 auction, with a $9.8m guidance, through Alexander Trovato and Daniel Patterson at CobdenHayson.
On Henley Marine Drive, the five-bedroom, three-bathroom 2002-builtresidence spans three storeys with a dual street frontage. It has views over Iron Cove Bay and Rodd Island towards the city skyline.
The property sold for $2.5m in 2002.
PRICE DROP TO LURE BUYER
The North Curl Curl oceanfront home of financial planner Sam Henderson, who appeared before the Hayne royal commission into banking misconduct, has had its price guidance dropped to $8m.
The five-bedroom, four-bathroom home had returned to the market last November, with $8.5m to $9.3m guidance, through Lisa Novak at Novak Properties. It had initially been listed in 2022.
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