Billionaire Robert Millner buys again in Observatory Tower for $5.2 million

Billionaire and Cowra farmer Robert Millner is clearly a fan of Observatory Tower  given he’s bought a second apartment in the luxury CBD building for $5.2 million as his Sydney base.

The busy chairman of the boards – he heads up Washington H Soul Pattinson, Brickworks, New Hope Coal and BKI Investments, Milton Corporation and Pitt Capital Partners – already owns in the Millers Point building, having first bought a two-bedroom garden apartment in 1998 for $530,000.

Millner’s latest purchase – off-market through the Vanguarde agency – is a three-bedroom spread in the prime north-east corner that was owned for the past 20 years by Elsa Morgan, widow of hotelier Maurice Morgan.

Millner was ranked 69th on last year’s Financial Review Rich List worth $1.16 billion thanks in part to the family’s Washington H Soul Pattinson’s pharmacy, resources, media, funds management and food and beverage investment businesses.

And no surprise to see Millner’s garden apartment is already being offered to buyers. The two-bedroom-plus-study spread has a $2.55 million guide through Vanguarde.

One for the Murdochs

Businessman and K2 Energy chairman Sam Gazal is downsizing from his Bellevue Hill home given $7 million to $7.5 million, which could be good news to his neighbours Lachlan and Sarah Murdoch.

The Murdochs have previously taken a shine to properties neighbouring their Georgian estate Le Manoir in Bellevue Hill, paying $4.4 million for one ripe for renovation a few years ago and $2.63 million for a derelict one on the other side of the boundary in 2010.

Admittedly, there’s no pending DA or looming renovation needed on Gazal’s battle-axe property that might lure the Murdochs to buy it before any builders arrive.

Instead all the work has been done since it last traded in 1996 for $1.09 million as a block of four apartments from the Bursill family.

It was later converted into two luxury apartments, of which Gazal kept one and sold its twin.

But, like so many Bellevue Hill home owners, when the apartment he’d sold returned to the market a few years later Gazal bought it back and has since returned the 900 square metre property into a single residence with five bedrooms, five bathrooms and a 12 metre swimming pool.

It is listed exclusively with Jason Pantzer, of Phillips Pantzer Donnelley.

The price of puppy love

Clearly we’ve all started spoiling our pet pooches judging by the industry windfalls playing out on the property market of late.

Take pet care baron Jeff David and his wife Genevieve, who look like they’ve done a U-turn on plans to downsize to their luxury Woolloomooloo waterfront apartment they bought two years ago for $3 million.

Instead of moving on from their Vaucluse mansion to the three-bedroom spread in the Wharf Terraces development behind the Royal Botanic Gardens as expected, the US-based couple have instead listed their Sydney spread with Alain Waitsman of LJ Hooker Double Bay for $4 million ahead of an April 16 auction.

And there’s no rethink on retaining their long-held Vaucluse residence with the Briony Fitzgerald interiors either.

This is the six-bedroom residence the couple bought in 1998 for $1.9 million soon after selling their their waterfront mansion down the road for $6 million. Waitsman had it briefly listed for $11 million last October but returns it to the market for $10 million.

David, son of grocery tycoon John David, has been a key player in Australia’s booming petcare industry having co-founded Mammoth Pet Holdings. What started as 10 Petbarn stores in 2006 grew to 100 stores in 2013 when it merged with Greencross Vets creating Australia’s largest pet and vet care chain.

Second time lucky in Rose Bay

Amway China’s Jack Zhijian Zhou and Guo Ying Ou have emerged as the $22.6 million buyers of the Rose Bay waterfront home of the late Rudi Sisic.

It was a decent consolation prize for the Mosman-based couple, given they were left as the $23.5 million underbidders on the house next door that sold in February to high-profile litigator Amanda Banton.

The family of Sisic sold the 900-square-metre property off-market through LJ Hooker Double Bay’s David Malouf after Sotheby’s Oliver Stillman came through with the Mosman buyers.

Don’t expect to see the Zhou family’s Mosman waterfront home they bought in 2005 for $4.7 million hit the market any time soon. Word is there is work to be done to the Rose Bay property first.

Moving up in Mosman

ABC Radio National presenter Dr Rachael Kohn and her property developer husband Tom Breen have sold their Mosman home given their recent upgrade in the suburb.

The couple bought the 1930s residence Tarascon late last year for $9.9 million from corporate advisor John Hobson and his wife Roslyn Wells, prompting them to list their nearby Federation property for $5.5 million with Michael Coombs, of LJ Hooker Avnu.

Coombs was tight-lipped on the sale result, but sources say it sold for more than $5 million. Settlement will confirm the result.

Meanwhile the mansion of property developer Michael Lowry and his wife Rita in the suburb’s nearby Golden Triangle is on the market.

The Susan Rothwell-designed residence last traded in 2014 for $6.7 million when sold by Newslink newsagency group founder Roger Wood and his wife Heather.

Coombs is asking $12 million for the four-bedroom residence with a swimming pool and basement garaging.

Double-digit deal in Bronte

Tony Martin, who co-founded boutique real estate advisory Anton Capital before it merged with Proprium Capital Partners, and his wife Lisa have upgraded from their Bronte home on dress-circle Yanko Avenue, buying five doors up the street for $11.5 million.

The February purchase was the first double-digit deal reported for the year, snagged by Alexander Phillips, of Phillips Pantzer Donnelley, and almost doubling the $6.05 million that the 1930s residence last traded for in 2014.

Calling time in Double Bay

Football executive Remo Nogarotto and his wife Stella look like they’ve downsized from their whole-floor apartment in Double Bay to a $3.3 million pad in Darling Point.

Records show, Nogarotto, a one-time Labor Party aspirant who decades later replaced Tony Nutt as Liberal Party state director, has been a Double Bay local for the past four years until his wife Stella pocketed $4.05 million for their Double Bay apartment in February from gynaecologist Gabriel Zipser and his wife Ann.

The Zipsers sold their Bellevue Hill home of 44 years last August for $8 million to artist and interior designer Anna Cayzer and her husband Martin Cayzer, co-founder of agricultural chemical supplier Titan Ag.

Aldred’s change of mind

Lindsay Aldred, International director of Cementaid Group, has had a rethink on his recent $6 million Dover Heights purchase.

The 1920s clifftop home on a level 544 square metres settled in his name in December after it was bought at a spirited auction at which nine registered bidders pushed the price $1.5 million over the reserve.

Complete with DA plans for redevelopment it returns to the market with Wayne Ihaka, of Raine & Horne Double Bay.

The Aldred family are no stranger to the neighbourhood. Most notably they sold the Werribee estate that was long home to family patriarch and Cementaid founder, the late Peter Aldred, for $20 million in 2016 to one of China’s wealthiest businessmen, leading food producer Sun Shaofeng.

More recently, Cementaid chairman Anthony Aldred has bought a Bowral retreat Hathaway for $3.26 million earlier this year with Michael Bligh gardens through Drew Lindsay Real Estate.