Disgraced doc’s ‘unliveable’ home sold for $11m

The ‘unliveable’ home of a disgraced podiatrist has sold more than double its purchase price of just four years ago.

1 John St, Woollahra sold for $10.6m recently. The agent said it was “unliveable”.

The “unliveable” Woollahra home of a disgraced podiatrist has sold for a whopping $10.6m, more than double the $4.8m purchase price of just four years ago.

The five-bedroom residence at 1 John St is in the name of Helen Lockhart Bours, wife of Dr Paul Bours who was found guilty of serious professional misconduct by the Health Care Complaints Commission in 2014.

The cases included a grandmother who wanted bunions removed and ended up having three toes amputated. Two other patients now have different-sized feet. And a fourth patient, a gardener, had his feet operated on but the pins used to fuse the joints came out of the bone into the flesh by about half a centimetre, a tribunal heard.

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Dr Paul Bours in 2014.

Artist’s impressions showing the newbuild “definitely helped” sell the home for $10.6m.

The plans by Ergo Architecture are for a five-bedroom, five-bathroom residence with gym, pool and separate home office.

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Bours “vigorously defended” the claims, saying the case brought against him was a “witch hunt”. His registration as a podiatrist was suspended for a year and he has since retired.

The couple sold a Hewlett St, Bronte home in early 2015 for $4.29m.

The agent who sold their John St home recently, Maclay Longhurst of Sotheby’s, didn’t want to discuss the identity of his vendors but records show it was bought in 2020.

He described the existing home on a 525 sqm block, the largest in the street, as “unliveable”.

Development approval for a new five-bedroom, five-bathroom residence designed by Ergo Architecture with gym, pool, garage and a separate home office with its own entrance was obtained last year.

It’s understood his clients intended to do the rebuild themselves, but, recognising there was just the two of them now, they needed to downsize.

Longhurst said the artist’s impressions of the new residence “definitely helped”.

“It gave the buyers confidence and helped them understand what can be built, which helped them achieve the price they did,” he said.

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An aerial view showing an artist’s impression of the new-build.

The buyers intend to proceed with the home as planned.

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Longhurst, who had been guiding $10m, said the result was “a big price”. The buyers intend to build the home as designed.

It’s just one of a range of huge results achieved by the high-achieving agent. He achieved the record price for a Surry Hills terrace without parking in the mid-$5m range for 471a Bourke St — which records show is owned by dentist Amrinder Oberoi.

And he set the record for a two-bedroom terrace in Potts Point, with the sale of 85 Victoria St for $3.75m. That went to a local investor, who can expect $1500 a week in rent.

And Longhurst also sold a three-bedroom Art Deco flat at 15/12 Rosemont Ave, Woollahra to a young professional couple for $3.86m. The guide was $3m.

Just updated title records show the buyers of a gutted penthouse in Manar in Potts Point that sold for $13.46m via Longhurst recently was artist Judy Weiss and her husband, Sam Weiss, long-time chairman of circuit board software company Altium. His business sold for $9 billion to Japanese chipmaker Renesas in February.

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Originally published as Disgraced doc’s ‘unliveable’ home sold for $11m