On the QT: Brian Flannery and wife Peggy amass 2026sqm worth $40m on Surfers Paradise beach
A Gold Coast rich lister and his wife have spent 14 years and $19m buying homes and apartments to amass one of the hottest slices of land in town - but they’re not finished yet.
Property
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BRIAN and Peggy Flannery, at a time when beachfront land prices have soared, have put a key part of a Surfers Paradise ‘jigsaw’ in place.
Rich-lister Brian and his wife have bought the last of seven apartments in Garfield Tce building Kuleena, completing an amalgamation that started in 2007.
They already owned the two buildings to the north of Kuleena, giving them ownership of 2026sqm of prime beachfront land.
The three properties — the first building was bought two decades ago – have cost them $19.3 million.
Sites along the Northcliffe Tce-Garfield Tce strip have galloped ahead in the past few months, hitting $20,000 a square metre.
That means the Brisbane couple’s holding could be worth $40 million or more.
There’s no indication that they’ll be selling it.
In fact, they have another iron in the fire – potentially securing a fourth building to add to their investment.
Nautilus is at the northern end of the three-property holding and sits on 1154sqm.
The Flannerys bought an apartment in the six-title building in 2014 and since have secured a further two.
Control of Nautilus would have them sitting on a near 3200sqm slab of beachfront land, a holding with endless redevelopment potential.
That’s somewhat larger than the beachfront sites in the same strip that have sold this year.
The latest is the sale last month by fellow Brisbanite Mick Power of 1500sqm in Garfield Tce.
Mick, a construction industry veteran and owner of the D’Arcy Arms Irish pub property in Surfers Paradise, achieved $30 million, or $20,000 a square metre.
His holding, plus two others that have sold, are destined to become home to big-ticket towers.
The Flannerys are far from strangers to development and might elect to do their own thing on their land.
Their flair has been highlighted at Byron Bay with the creation of the Elements Resort and Spa.
At the Gold Coast’s southern end the 65-year-old Kirra Beach Hotel has been bowled and the Flannery camp has embarked on a $380 million project that will deliver a new hotel and apartment towers.
The Flannerys also can be sellers.
A Surfers Paradise site close to the river was bought from receivers for $6.38 million in 2011 and sold, with an approval for a 289-unit tower, to Chinese interests for $16 million six years later.
It wasn’t the first, or anywhere near the biggest, deal done with Chinese buyers.
Brian in 2009 took home a $530 million cheque when he sold his stake in coal-miner Felix Resources to Yanzhou Coal.
He and a partner went on to buy the last coal-fired power station owned by the NSW Government for $1 million.
The deal was a winner – the partners apparently shared a $62 million dividend in 2019-20.
Meanwhile, should the Flannery beachfront buildings, including Nautilus, one day be flattened, the couple won’t be short of a top-shelf holiday home.
Peggy owns a whole-floor apartment in the beachfront Jade tower near the heart of Surfers, bought from a mortgagee for $3 million in 2011.
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