View to a thrill for agents at the top of the luxury property market

When two Melbourne businessmen forked out nearly $22m sight unseen for a Byron Bay beach house, agents knew the market was finally turning at the upper end.

Sydney agent Ben Stewart at 147 Kurraba Point Road. Picture: John Feder

When two Melbourne businessmen forked out nearly $22m sight unseen for a beach house on Byron Bay’s trendy Wategos Beach on the far-north NSW coast recently, upscale agents knew the market was finally turning at the upper end.

Real estate agents reckon when the mandatory 14-day hotel quarantine for expats ends it will further power the nation’s luxury real estate sector as cashed-up ­returning Australians clamour for properties priced above $15m.

“Once they drop the 14-day hotel quarantine you will see a lot of expats and foreigners coming to Australia looking for property,” said Christie’s International Realty agent Ken Jacobs.

“Obviously Sydney’s eastern suburbs is the priority area, along with the North Shore and Northern Beaches, but prime regional areas are also on the radar.”

Although stock levels are down on this time last year, there are still plenty of big-ticket mansions and estates on the market as vendors look to capitalise on the groundswell of buyer appetite in the low-interest-rate environment.

In Sydney, Mr Jacobs continues to market the Boyd mansion atop the ANZ tower at an asking price of $66m, as well as the waterfront home of Garrick Hawkins at 21 Coolong Road, Vaucluse in Sydney’s Eastern Suburbs, which has a $55m price tag.

“There are fewer mansions to buy but there is certainly an appetite for them,” Jacobs said.

At Crown’s Barangaroo, the two-level penthouse with six bedrooms has price expectations of more than $100m, while on Sydney’s North Shore, CBRE’s Ben Stewart sold $90m worth of luxury residential apartments at the Kurraba Residences development overlooking Sydney Harbour at its launch last Saturday.

The average sale price for the 16 apartments sold out of the 24 units on offer was a hefty $6m, with Mr Stewart reckoning the units could increase by as much as 25 per cent in value before their completion in 2022.

Of the eight apartments still for sale, the standout is the complex’s penthouse, replete with a private pool, which would secure a suburb record if it sells for its expected asking price of $40m.

“We are dealing with two parties at the moment on the penthouse (and) we are likely to close that sale out within coming weeks, which at $40m would be a North Shore record,” Mr Stewart said.

“The penthouse is like a house sitting on top of an apartment building, it is so private from every room with more than 650sq m and front-row position to the Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge.”

Veteran Melbourne buyer’s agent David Morrell said the coronavirus crisis had really shaken up the traditional old-money top end of Melbourne’s mansion market.

While homes are selling ahead of expectations in upmarket family suburbs such as Malvern and Armadale, he said some business people were looking at Victoria differently in the wake of the stage four lockdowns imposed by the Andrews government.

“Melbourne lost some of its gloss as an international city,” Mr Morrell said. And although prices seemed to be generally heading up, he said there were some pockets even in blue-ribbon Toorak where homes had not sold.

Mr Morrell said more than 15 homes worth over $20m were now quietly available and “there has never been that choice before”.

One of the few that is being openly marketed is Chiverton in Toorak, with the double-storey French Mediterranean mansion on Irving Road being touted to sell for a price of about $36m. The sale, being handled by Kay & Burton’s Michael Gibson, has already drawn interest from nearby homeowners in the ritzy suburb.

On Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula, with activity at the top end of the market stretching from Flinders to Portsea, the traditional holiday bolt-holes on both Port Phillip and Western Port bays have assumed a new popularity in the wake of the virus lockdowns.

Several parties are vying to buy the clifftop mansion that Roger Kimberley, brother of Just Jeans founder Craig, has quietly put on the market in Kildrummie Court, Sorrento, with expectations of up to $25m.

In Brisbane, the heritage-listed Nyrambla estate in wealthy Ascot has just hit the market through Ray White Ascot, while in Perth a luxury Dalkeith hacienda with four bedrooms and parking for eight cars has just hit the market, also through Ray White. It last sold for $4.25m back in 2006.

In New Zealand’s Queenstown, Australian multi-millionaire Tim Roberts and his mining magnate mate Chris Ellison have just listed their 18,000ha alpine station on the shores of Lake Wakatipu.

They have put a price tag on it of $NZ50m ($47.3m)