Dale Thomas: Former Collingwood, Carlton player lists Glen Iris home
Having plenty of time to think during a stint on a reality show led to Dale Thomas listing the Glen Iris house he transformed, including a luxury touch people would “probably laugh” at him for.
AFL premiership player Dale Thomas is kicking on from the Glen Iris house he transformed from an “untouched 1950s” original to a modern trophy home.
The former Collingwood and Carlton star told the Herald Sun he came to the decision to list the 19 Allenby Avenue property while “in the jungle” filming the latest season of reality show I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!
“I had a lot of time to think about a lot of things — where I was gonna go with life, for (partner) Natasha (Bongiorno) and I, what the next steps looked like,” he said.
“It’s time to venture out and start a reno of our own, find a family house for ourselves.”
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The three-level, four-bedroom house is set to be auctioned by Marshall White Boroondara on December 12, with a $2.7-$2.9m price guide
CoreLogic records show Thomas paid $855,000 for the property in 2009, during his fourth of eight seasons with the Pies — a stint that netted a flag in 2010 and All-Australian selection in 2006.
The 33-year-old went on to play five seasons at Carlton before hanging up the boots in 2019.
He recalled his house had “all the classic features” when he snapped it up — including a “big iron gas stove that weighed about 15 tonnes” that proved a challenge to remove during his “big reno”.
“It was a lovely old home, but it hadn’t been touched since the 1950s,” he said.
Its prestigious past included being the home of late former Victorian Premier Lindsay Thompson.
Thomas said he lived in the original house for a period before beginning his revamp, which involved opening up the house to “make it feel more spacious”, reconfiguring the upstairs level to add a walk-in wardrobe to the main bedroom, and adding a pool and an undercover alfresco deck with a built-in barbecue and TV to the yard.
He said the latter had become “one of my favourite areas”, where he had hosted many dinner parties and cricket matches.
“If you told anyone you put a four-person swim-up bar in your pool, they’d probably laugh at you,” he said.
“But as a 23-, 24-year-old kid designing a house, the idea of having a resort lifestyle in your backyard was appealing.”
Thomas’s five-year-old daughter, Tilly, was also “mad for the pool”. His cat, Drizzy, preferred sitting in “his little spot in the front garden underneath the yuccas”.
The former footballer had also loved the Glen Iris area, particularly enjoying the “unbelievable oysters, great wine list and good steak” at Riversa in Malvern East, and riding his bike to footy training along the Gardiners Creek Trail, which started “100m from my house”.
In addition to finding his next home, Thomas hoped his next steps would include doing some of the post-footy travel he’d planned before the pandemic struck.
“It’s been an interesting year to be my first one out (of football),” he said.
“I’ve enjoyed a lot of dim sims, and now I’m looking forward to hopefully doing some trips around Australia and living somewhat of a normal life.”
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Originally published as Dale Thomas: Former Collingwood, Carlton player lists Glen Iris home