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This was published 9 months ago
His dad helped turn a surfer-hippie hangout into a prestige suburb. Now he’s bought for $16m
By Lucy Macken
Venture capitalist Daniel Darling and his wife Sophie have bought on the Ben Buckler headland for $16 million, around the corner from the Darling family’s oceanfront trophy home Deepwater House.
The purchase follows Darling’s sale of his Point Piper art deco penthouse for $11 million to Bondi Beach-based Andrea Roberts, the wife of rich lister and Multiplex heir Andrew Roberts.
The Darlings’ new digs is a five-bedroom family home that was sold by Raine & Horne’s Ric Serrao on behalf of fintech entrepreneur David Lavecky, chief and co-founder of global blockchain company Canvas, and his wife Carina.
The three-level house last traded in 2013 for $5.4 million when sold by Bell Potter Securities director James Unger.
Darling, founder of venture capital firm Darling Ventures, is from a long line of prominent Australian business figures, among them the longest serving director of BHP Gordon Darling, and Darling’s father, Michael Darling, the prominent investor and chairman of Caledonia Private.
Indeed, while Darling snr is renowned in investment circles for his financial savvy, property watchers know him for being among the trophy home-owning set who spearheaded North Bondi’s transition from surfer-hippie hangout to prestige neighbourhood.
In 2008, Darling and his wife, exotic cookbook writer Manuela Darling-Gansser, completed the purchase of a block of 10 apartments on the rock shelf known as Mermaid Rocks for $14 million, converting it into a family compound known as Deepwater House. The striking contemporary building was designed by their former son-in-law, architect Nick Tobias and built by Bellevarde Constructions with separate apartments for the Darlings, and their children and grandchildren.
In the years since the Darlings first took to North Bondi they have been joined locally by the likes of billionaire Nick Molnar, nursing home scion Mark Moran, heiress Orna Triguboff and rich lister Will Vicars.
Heights of fashion
Fashion designer Bec Cooper and her husband Dan Lewinsky have replaced their recently sold North Bondi home, paying about $12 million for a clifftop house in Dover Heights.
It was an off-market purchase of the designer digs with five bedrooms, four bathrooms and a swimming pool after the North Bondi-based couple were introduced to the property by buyer’s agent Simon Cohen, of Cohen Handler.
Cooper, co-founder of Bec + Bridge label with Bridget Yorston, sold her North Bondi home in October for about $6.5 million, having renovated it since 2019 when it last sold for $4.27 million.
Best-seller’s home
Best-selling author Stephanie Dowrick has sold her Balmain terrace after almost a quarter of a century ownership, pocketing $4.2 million in an off-market sale by BresicWhitney’s Andrew Liddell.
It is a downsize for Dowrick, who has purchased an apartment for $2.3 million in the Jacksons Landing development in Pyrmont.
The psychotherapy writer, humanitarian activist and interfaith minister purchased the four-bedroom terrace when it was newly built in 1999 as part of Balmain’s converted Colgate Palmolive complex, paying $780,000.
Odds on Vaucluse
Tracey Bartholomew, wife of big punter-turned-online bookie Sean Bartholomew, has returned to Vaucluse’s home ownership records paying $9.5 million for contemporary digs overlooking Vaucluse House.
The five-bedroom house was sold by Highland Property’s David Malouf on behalf of Wen Zhang, a director of China’s food, beverage and medicine giant Goubuli Group and daughter of the company’s chairman Zhang Yansen.
Zhang has since purchased up the road, paying $15.8 million for the home of Singapore-based PR queen Roxy Jacenko.
The Bartholomews sold their former Vaucluse home for $12.5 million in 2017.
Byron Bay buyers
Ele and Dan Gammell, co-founders of First Light private equity firm, have paid $3.8 million for a Coopers Shoot property in the Byron Bay hinterland.
The 2.3 hectare property purchase comes six months after the couple sold in Tamarama for a loss, having paid $7.5 million in 2021. It was sold earlier this year for $6.895 million to crypto trader Bryn Solomon.
Gammell, son of former Seven board member and Kerry Stokes’s long-time lieutenant Peter Gammell, and Ele are based in Surry Hills where in 2015 they paid $5 million for the converted warehouse home of the late artist Colin Lanceley.
Cash deal
Good news for 23-year-old Jade Burger, who has snapped up a house in North Bondi for $6.8 million - no mortgage required.
Burger is the daughter of commercial property developer Robert Burger, who in 2018 bought a waterfront house in Vaucluse for $38.8 million from Chinese supermarket chain co-owner Huang Qiarong.
Shortly before it sold the Vaucluse residence had been leased by Huang’s associate, e-commerce entrepreneur Richard Qiangdong Liu, founder of JD.com, and previously rented by Hollywood A-listed Leonardo DiCaprio.
Burger’s new digs was sold by Edwina Lester, who owned it since 2011 having paid $2.34 million.