The lofty renovation project behind the beachside house that earns $450,000 a year

Bondi-based Jason Johnson calls the northern beaches his spiritual home, so buying a property on the peninsula was only natural for him.

“I was a member of the Whale Beach Surf Club and a paid lifeguard for six weeks at North Palm Beach before I travelled overseas and started my career as a lawyer,” said Johnson, chief executive of search firm Johnson Partners.

Jason Johnson in their renovated home La Palma in Palm Beach, which they bought and renovated during the pandemic.Credit: James Brickwood

But his wife Portia was not sold on the idea of buying on the peninsula until they travelled to Palm Beach at the beginning of 2020 to check out a tired yet charming house atop Barrenjoey Road.

“I convinced Portia to look at the property,” Johnson said. “She humoured me. When we were up there, 15 dolphins popped up out in the bay, and it was a magical experience.”

They inspected the 696-square-metre block at 10am and by midday had bought the four-bedroom, four-bathroom home for $9.17 million.

“We did the deal within two hours of seeing it. It had that impact on us. It was still a beautiful, charming home. But it had not been invested in the way it deserved. We relished the opportunity to realise its full potential.”

The home is one of the very few on the peninsula that has views of Palm Beach, Pittwater and Lion Island.

By that afternoon, Johnson had called award-winning designer Yasmine Ghoniem of YSG Studio, who has completed home redesigns of the likes of Zoë Foster Blake, to embark on their next renovation project; La Palma is their seventh redesign together.

Although the home had good bones, it had the typical interiors for the area that the Johnsons believed were ripe for renewal.

“We agreed to create something with a bit more personality than most Palm Beach homes. That’s worked really well for us,” Johnson said.

The property had good bones but looked a touch tired with the white, beachy aesthetic running throughout.

They have since transformed it into a Mediterranean-inspired home thanks to an extensive cosmetic renovation that has landed them on a handful of design award shortlists. It’s not only a family holiday house for the Johnsons but also a short-term rental, and available for photoshoots too.

“It has resonated really strongly with people who have stayed, and we’ve had well over 40 photoshoots in the house.”

The home, which is one of the few that overlooks Palm Beach and Pittwater, fetches $5500 a night at the peak of summer, with one booking over two weeks in Christmas totalling $77,000, Johnson said.

“It is the highest grossing property on the northern beaches, we’re told by agents,” Johnson said. “The accommodation bookings have been extraordinary … you feel a million miles from Sydney, but it is still quite practical to get to.”

The property out-earns most Australians in a year, making $450,000 in revenue, according to their selling agent BJ Edwards of LJ Hooker Palm Beach. But does it out-earn Johnson?

The interior of the Palm Beach home, which was in good shape, prior to the cosmetic renovation.

“[My search firm] is a very profitable enterprise … my day job allows me to buy and renovate beautiful properties, which is my passion,” Johnson said.

“We said to Yasmine: ‘We want to feel like we’re in a sophisticated retreat but with hints of European day clubs that you go to around the Mediterranean’, and she really picked it up and ran with that.”

Ghoniem described the home as super-relaxed and playful with an underlying global aesthetic.

“He is my longest standing relationship with a client. He has always really valued design, so there’s never a convincing conversation,” Ghoniem said. “It’s a very trusting relationship, which is really great and affords some really amazing outcomes because of that trust.

“Everyone goes on holiday and tries to keep that momentum of excitement and people don’t remember that so we tried to instil that in the interior so it feels like you’re going on holiday.”

The home is filled with tonal colours and a whole host of patterns, materials and textures, giving a summer holiday glow throughout.

The cosmetic renovation has transformed the home from a tired, beachy property to a Mediterranean-holiday house.

There are bespoke paintings, including French washed walls and ceilings and hand-painted elements on the doors and beams in the sunroom, as well as curated art walls with local Sydney galleries.

They also collaborated with an Alexandria-based textile company, Think Positive, that has archival collections from the 50s, 60s and 70s.

“We spent a whole day perusing the archive. They created a spirited, fun playful story. ,” Ghoniem said.

There is also a red and white detail that occurs as a motif throughout the home, she added, that can be spotted from anywhere you look.

The Johnsons are now selling to take on their next project with Ghoniem.

Expressions of interest for the home with a $13.5 million price guide close on Wednesday, October 30.