Harry Triguboff pounces on prized site at Sydney’s Bay Little Cove

The billionaire property developer has struck a deal to buy a prized Little Bay Cove waterfront development in Sydney’s eastern suburbs.

Billionaire developer Harry Triguboff has bought a prized piece of real estate in Sydney’s east. Picture: Hollie Adams

Harry Triguboff might be reducing the price tag of units across his apartment empire but that has not stopped the billionaire developer from acquiring more sites, striking a deal to buy a prized 11 hectare Little Bay Cove waterfront development in Sydney’s eastern suburbs at close to $245 million.

Mr Triguboff’s Meriton Apartments Group has edged out cashed-up Chinese developer Country Garden to get his hands on the highly sought after site, near La Perouse, which after development will have an end value of more than $700 million.

The vendor is Malaysia’s TA Global Bhd which has completed civil works across the site as well as masterplan development consent. Several phases of development including luxury apartments and villas are already under construction.

TA Global became involved with the project in 2010, entering into a joint venture development deal with property funds house Charter Hall Group.

Mr Triguboff, last week told The Australian he had dropped prices for his new wave of apartments by 5 per cent over the past year, saying demand is strong but the crackdown by the banking regulator has taken buyers out of the market.

Regulators, who assume prices will continue to rise, have been increasingly tough on investors and foreign buyers, he noted.

Even so, his Meriton group is pushing ahead with a huge development pipeline, starting with nearly 1000 units in Sydney in the past two months in the inner and middle suburbs of Mascot, Rosebery and Homebush. He has also settled the sale of just over 1000 Sydney units over the same time frame. The deal is believed to have been negotiated by Angelo Mantsis, group acquisitions manager for Meriton, JLL agents Ben Hunter and Sam Brewer and Knight Frank’s Tim Holtsbaum and Eugene Evgenikos. They all declined to comment.