Billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes adds to Sydney property portfolio, now $240m+

A vacant block of land on the far reaches of the Northern Beaches was snapped up recently for $1.425 million after one day on the market.

The transaction would go unreported except that the buyer happens to be tech billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes, and his purchase has sparked speculation among the neighbours that he might be circling to buy all their homes.

Such speculation is unfounded but isn’t surprising given the co-founder of software giant Atlassian is best known for his seemingly insatiable appetite for luxury real estate, amassing arguably the country’s largest collections of private homes, weekenders and farms for his personal use.

Property records reveal Cannon-Brookes and corporate entities linked to him have purchased almost $250 million worth of real estate since his 30th birthday in 2010, of which the vast bulk – almost $210 million – has been snapped up in the past two years alone.

It has done more than just impress property-obsessed Sydneysiders. State coffers have benefitted to the tune of $20 million in stamp duty.

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Then there’s the annual land tax bill on all but his primary residence, the $100 million Fairwater estate on the beachfront in Point Piper he bought from the estate of the late Lady Mary Fairfax.

“There have been individuals who over the years have owned up to six or seven residential homes in Sydney, but I don’t think anyone comes anywhere close to that amount of personal property,” said veteran prestige agent Bill Malouf, of LJ Hooker Double Bay.

Sydney has long boasted an impressive roll-call of high-end residential property owners, such as the Packer, Lowy and Kahlbetzer families, Prue MacLeod, Leon Kamenev, Justin Hemmes, Will Vicars, Theo Onisforou, Nick Paspaley, Bruce McWilliam, and lawyer Bill Blackshaw, but few portfolios have been entirely for family use nor matched the big-ticket prices paid by Cannon-Brookes alone.

It makes for a lot of weekenders to choose from. There are three properties at the Southern Highlands to visit, of which Rosehill Farm in Kangaloon is no doubt the most comfortable. There’s the Palm Beach getaway on Snapperman Beach, the Great Mackerel Beach bunk house from which to explore nature and the more recently acquired Newport trophy home Paloma that now comes with an extra 2253-square-metre block of bushland behind sold recently by LJ Hooker’s David Watson.

Closer to home, the family has had an affinity for the Double Bay village, first acquiring the Professor Leslie Wilkinson house SeaDragon to move to when they renovated in Centennial Park, followed by a $9.1 million beachside semi and later the Verona residence of which they recently completed a renovation to live there while they undertake work on Fairwater.

Fairwater comes with its own real estate accoutrement, like the $12 million house that abuts the side fence and an apartment in the block next door. The Woollahra mansion bought from the German government is expected to be used as office space for family ventures.

Funding it has been the software start-up Atlassian he and his mate Scott Farquhar listed on the US stock exchange in 2015, landing them both a place on the Financial Review Rich List among last year’s top 10 richest Australians with an estimated worth of almost $10 billion.

Cannon-Brookes declined to comment for this story, but sources say his real estate acquisitions come second to his far more heady investment in the green energy sector. His green energy investments amount to about $1 billion, whereas his real estate purchases amount to only 2.5 per cent of his personal wealth.

But for Sydney’s high-end home owners his penchant for fine real estate has also acted as a significant confidence boost given the handful of records to his name.

“He’s definitely a market leader in terms of setting the benchmark for these high-end values,” said Elliott Placks, director of the Ray White Double Bay office. “But these are legacy assets. They don’t come up for sale often and he has the financial power to take up the opportunity to buy them.”

His purchase of Fairwater two years ago is the only nine-figure house sale result in Australia and his Newport purchase in June set a $24.5 million record for the whole Northern Beaches. In March, as the COVID-19 pandemic was starting to affect Sydney, he smashed the Woollahra high by $2 million when he paid $18.5 million for the official residence to Germany’s consul-general.

His former Centennial Park mansion Braelin set a suburb high of $12 million when he bought it in 2015 and reset the record two years ago when sold for $16.5 million and his Southern Highlands farm Widgee Waa at Kangaloon matched the district record when he bought it in 2019 for $15 million.

“I don’t think he’s overpaid for these properties.” says Malouf. “He obviously sees the value in it for his family, but these assets will also still accumulate in value in the future.”