NAB chief Ross McEwan banks on $2.1m Gold Coast apartment at Main Beach

NAB chief executive Ross Mc­Ewan has bought a Gold Coast apartment as the glitter strip shines amid boomtime sale conditions.

NAB chief executive Ross Mc­Ewan has bought a Gold Coast apartment as the glitter strip shines amid boomtime sale conditions.

The Melbourne-based banker and his wife Stephanie have spent $2.12m to buy at Main Beach, sans mortgage.

The couple secured a ninth-floor, two-bedroom, two-bathroom Liberty Pacific apartment without offloading any of his shares in the bank.

The Liberty Pacific tower, Main Beach, sold through Sotheby’s.

The 198sq m, Mirvac-built apartment had previously traded at $1.48m in 2017, having first sold off the plan in 1999 at $550,000. Mirvac had bought the site from the Japanese-owned Anabuki Corporation, after fighting off the Raptis Group and Meriton Apartments.

PropTrack puts the two-bedroom Main Beach apartment median at $1.2m, up by 25 per cent annually.

McEwan, who took the NAB top job in mid-2019 after coming from the Royal Bank of Scotland in Britain, quickly bought a new $3.8m duplex apartment in ­Toorak.

The purchase follows the pattern over many decades of New Zealanders buying on Queensland’s Gold Coast.

The main game

New Zealand timber haulage tycoon Dennis Glenn and wife Pip sold in the adjacent Liberty Panorama complex last month.

The sub-penthouse fetched $4.3m through Mathew Lloyd at Lloyd Estate Agents.

It was bought by two Toowoomba doctors, having last sold in 2001 at $1.37m to the Napier-based couple.

The top Main Beach sale so far this year was the $8.05m penthouse sold by the Norman Park-based Hamell Retail founders Daniel and Kylee Burke.

A penthouse in Malibu, a nearby tri-level apartment that comes with 775sq m of space, remains listed in the first Gold Coast residential tower completed by Sunland in 1994.

It has been listed by Hong Kong-based CHI International hospitality company boss Philip Morais and his wife Eileen with a $7m price expectation.

They bought in 1994 for $1,360,000.

The marketing by Michael Vettoretto at Queensland Sotheby’s International advises the residential-only complex has seen 90 per cent of the owners enjoy a 10-year tenure.

Clearance seesaw

The national preliminary clearance rate sat at 71 per cent last week, as Melbourne’s clearance rate rose above the 70 per cent mark after dipping below for the past two weeks.

Melbourne came in at 71.9 per cent from the 604 results collected so far by CoreLogic.

But amid some subtle seesawing capital city results, Sydney’s preliminary clearance fell to 69.1 per cent, below the 70 per cent mark for the first time since March, with 544 results collected so far.

Brisbane recorded its highest rate since June at 74 per cent.

Canberra was at 71 per cent, while Adelaide’s preliminary clearance rate fell to 76 per cent but remained the nation’s strongest market.

PropTrack economist Anne Flaherty calculates that weekly auction volumes will rise to around 2200 properties over the next fortnight, in a “significant jump on last year’s numbers”.

“The rise in year-on-year auctions can in part be attributed to the improvement in selling conditions,” Flaherty noted.

“Higher clearance rates and growing prices have also increased the confidence of vendors to sell via auction.”

Hawthorn on high

Melbourne had the nation’s top advised result after three bidders sought the keys to Killena, the four-bedroom, three-bathroom home at 25 Hawthorn Grove, Hawthorn.

It sold for $8.02m through Kay & Burton agent Scott Patterson after 23,000 views on realestate.com.au.

25 Hawthorn Grove sold for $8m.

The crowd of almost 100 that gathered in the front yard of one of Hawthorn’s most picturesque homes watched the bidding promptly exceed its $7.5m reserve after the opening $7m offer.

Its four-week campaign saw 140 groups inspect the 1896 home which had been listed in late May with an unchanged $6.8m to $7.3m guidance.

The tuckpointed red brick residence comes with a triple-arched hallway, painted stained-glass windows, high decorative ceilings, marble open fireplaces and polished floorboards. It features hydronic heating, ducted airconditioning, bespoke lighting and a 50,000-litre underground rainwater tank. There is a rear double garage with workshop, storeroom and studio on its 1133sq m holding.

The hammer fell to a local family who have recently returned from the US, represented by buyers agent Mal James. The vendors had their sellers representative, Tonya Davidson. “The auction result will hopefully bring back some of that vendor confidence that has dropped off since the start of the year,” Patterson said.

“There is a shortage of quality family homes on the market, so we were very confident in taking this one to auction.”

It last sold at $3.85m in 2014 when bought by interior designer Trudie Cunningham and husband James from Professor Pip Pattison and her metallurgist husband, Ian.

For three decades it was held by Vasey Housing after its 1952 purchase for £7500 by Jessie Vasey, an acclaimed campaigner for the support of war widows even before she joined their ranks when her husband, Major General George Vasey, was killed in a military plane crash in 1945.

Vasey also campaigned for the Aged Persons Homes Act in 1954, which saw the Menzies Government matching funds raised by voluntary organisations in providing affordable accommodation. The pioneering legislation came apparently at the behest of Dame Pattie Menzies given post-war concerns about housing for the elderly.

Ray of Sunshine

The nation’s dearest weekend auction offering was 33 Ross Crescent, Sunshine Beach, a beachfront trophy home designed by Geoffrey Pie for the Sykes family.

It had been scheduled for private auction through Tom and Rebekah Offermann of Tom Offermann Real Estate.

33 Ross Crescent, Sunshine Beach.

The listing for the five-bedroom, four-bathroom house on 3520sq m with 62 metres of beach frontage disappeared from listing websites over the weekend.

The property was purchased in 1987 for $200,000, prior to the home’s construction.

“Our instructions are to keep the outcome private,” Tom advised Competing Bids.

Auction action

The Ray White network had 335 properties scheduled for weekend auction with 70 per cent sold under the hammer.

With more than four bidders registered at its auctions, it calculated auction day prices soared 11 per cent over the highest pre-auction offers lodged prior to Saturday.

Market analysts will be watching both listing supply levels plus the numbers of bidders as spring approaches.