Bitcoin entrepreneur Kain Warwick adds Bronte digs to $33m housing stockpile

Bitcoin entrepreneur Kain Warwick is proving to be one of the eastern beaches’ best buyers in the wake of the cryptocurrency boom, securing luxury houses from North Bondi to Tamarama and now Bronte for a total of $33.25 million.

The most recent purchase by the 40-year-old founder of derivatives trading platform Synthetix is the Bronte home of online gambling website founder Joshua Chan for $12.2 million – rumoured to be a home for his parents, Allana and Kim Warwick, the latter of whom is the renowned tennis legend and six-time grand slam champion.

Warwick’s purchase in a company name he owns with his wife Raphaella almost triples the $4.55 million Chan paid for the house in 2012 and was well above the $9.5 million guide offered by Raine & Horne’s Ric Serrao and PPD’s Alexander Phillips.

Chan, the founder of one of the largest online gambling information and player feedback sites LCB (Latest Casino Bonuses), is heading to Bondi Beach, where he made his own first impression on Sydney’s high-end property market when he paid an auction record high of $20.1 million for the penthouse of yachtsman James Mayo in March.

Warwick’s first purchase on the eastern suburbs beaches was in May last year when he paid $5.02 million for a six-bedroom house with a swimming pool in North Bondi, and was followed more recently by his $16.5 million purchase of the Tamarama home of McGrath Estate Agents board member Shane Smollen.

Whale Beach to Palm Beach trades

Chef and restaurateur Jonathan Barthelmess​, who co-owns Potts Point’s The Apollo Restaurant with Sam Christie, has bought a Whale Beach getaway with his partner Augusta Goldsmith for about $7.4 million.

This is the beachside house on prized Malo Road previously owned by former deal maker Bruce Hancox, investment advisor to billionaire Lang Walker, and his partner Judi Lenart, who bought it in 2017 for $4.65 million from Valerie Agnew, widow of the late Agnew Wines founder Brian Agnew.

Hancox sold through LJ Hooker’s David Edwards and his son BJ, and then took his money around the headland to Palm Beach where settlement records show Edwards sold him the weekender of star investment banker Matthew Grounds for $8 million.

It was one of two neighbouring houses on Palm Beach Road developed by Brian Whelan, who sold the first to tennis champ Lleyton Hewitt and his then soapie star wife Bec Hewitt in 2005 for $4.4 million, and followed up a month later by selling the next-door home to Grounds and his wife Kimberley for $4.3 million.

Meanwhile, Darling Point locals Tony Maple-Brown, founder and former chief of property software group Rockend Technology, and his wife Suzanne, a former Miss Australia of 1969, have bought a Palm Beach getaway on the Pittwater waterfront for $9.7 million through Sotheby’s Harriet France and Kathryn Hall, of her eponymous agency.

Airline exec on Darlinghurst high

Former Jetstar Japan co-chief executive Nick Rohrlach has not only landed back in Sydney but made a decent debut on local title records, buying a sub-penthouse in Darlinghurst’s Elan building for $6.1 million.

Rohrlach’s arrival has been no secret this year, given he was appointed to a senior role at Qantas Loyalty and quickly poached by Virgin Australia early this year to head up its loyalty program.

Qantas has successfully sought an injunction on Rohrlach’s start at Virgin’s Velocity until a contractual dispute can be heard, which is expected to delay his start until later this year.

Rohrlach and his partner Hanteng Gong bought the three-bedroom spread after just one day on the market through McGrath’s Adam Regan.

Looking to set real Mona Vale record

Christine Johnston, the mother of The Real Housewives of Sydney’s Lisa Oldfield, has hopes of setting a Mona Vale suburb high with the sale of her beachfront home for $11 million.

At that level, it would smash the $7.55 million high set in 2018 when property developer Bill Kinsella and his medico wife Iris Reinecke bought Infinity on the clifftop.

Johnston’s four-bedroom designer residence was built in 2009 by property developer and former Manly Sea Eagles owner Max Delmege, who incidentally recently welcomed twins Tommy and Lexi with his wife Samantha, 39 years his junior.

Johnston picked it up for $3.5 million in 2011 mortgagee-in-possession after it was on the market for a year and after two failed auctions.

McGrath’s James Baker has set a July 31 auction.

Nearby, Boston Consulting Group managing director Brad Noakes has claimed the Collaroy house price record paying $16 million for the landmark home of oil and gas multimillionaire Russell Staley and his wife, Jennifer.

Acclaimed architect Peter Stutchbury designed the Point House on the northern-most point of the Collaroy Basin, and the former Rich Lister handed the keys to Belle Property’s Brendan Pomponio to sell three years ago.

Details of the buyer have remained a mystery since Pomponio has made no comment, but settlement records revealed Noakes’ purchase this week. It comes a month after Noaks sold his Mosman home through fellow Belle agent Tim Foote.

Noakes bought the Clifton Gardens home for $6.5 million in 2010 from billionaire Greg Goodman and returned it to the market for $12.5 million to $14 million.

Still, with the northern beaches holiday homes of Mosmanites, hotelier Matthew Fallon has sold his Newport beachfront house for $10 million – more than double the $4.75 million he paid for it in 2014.

Records show the Myola Road house was bought by oenologist (winemaker) and owner of Wine Country Tours Richard Everett and his wife, Julie, after they were introduced to the property on the quiet by buyer’s agent Peter Kelaher, of PK Property.

Seaforth and prosper

The newly appointed chief of fintech firm Linkly, Frerk-Malte Feller and his wife, Dinah, have traded up to Seaforth, buying an award-winning house for $9.15 million.

The home of educator Sonja Walters and her yachtie husband Adrian was listed with Clarke & Humel’s Michael Clarke with a guide of $8 million to $8.8 million but sold for more than that after just 11 days on the market.

The Walters family commissioned the ultra-contemporary house – one-time winner of the Master Builders Award for high-end construction – following their purchase of the corner property in 2007 for $2.22 million.

Feller is a former senior executive at Facebook based in California before he came to Australia in 2019 to take up the role of global chief operating officer of AfterPay.

Yachtie sails into Elizabeth Bay

Are yachtie and former intellectual property firm Spruson & Ferguson chair David Griffith and his wife Penny planning a downsize from their long-held Hunters Hill home? Certainly, the couple have alternative lodgings if so, having settled on an Elizabeth Bay waterfront apartment for $10.5 million.

The couple have bought the two-storey penthouse of Forager Funds chief Jeff Weeden and his partner Gareth Bowler, more than doubling the $4.7 million it last traded for eight years ago.

The two-storey spread is set atop the Billyard Gardens complex where Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton bought into Sydney’s KIPPERS movement (Kids In Parents’ Pockets Eroding Retirement Savings) of 2013 when they paid $1.92 million for an apartment downstairs for their children.

Ballard’s Paul Ephron and Clint Ballard launched it to the market early this year with hopes of more than $10 million.

A caffeine hit … and run

Campos coffee founder Will Young and his wife Louise are set to pack up their Dulwich Hill home they bought in 2013 for a then-high of $1.96 million to put it up for sale and return to live in his Bermuda homeland.

The move comes as Dutch beverage giant JDE Peet is set to finalise a buy-out of the iconic roaster, founded as a single humble cafe and roaster in Newtown in 2002 that has expanded to serve more than 600 cafes across the country.

The suburb high has since been broken a few times, and now stands at $3.25 million setwhen the owner of Chicken George Peter Papas sold the nearby Federation residence Fairview in 2016.

Chase Property’s Peter Adonopulos is yet to set a guide for the 1895-built house.

Buying up big in Bellevue Hill

Burcu Devaraj, the wife of cybersecurity boss Santosh Devaraj, has bought the Bellevue Hill residence of Jackie Brown, wife of lawyer and property developer Gil Baron for about $11 million.

The contemporary MCK Architects-designed house was launched early this year with a $10 million to $11 million guide but never sold and soon after relisted with Ray White Double Bay’s Ashley Bierman and Elliott Placks, who promptly sold at the top of the range.

Santosh Devaraj is executive chairman of Secure Logic, which was acquired by ASX-listed security services firm Tesserent in April.

So long New York, g’day Paddington

Goldman Sachs’ head of equity capital markets, Ian Taylor, has recently returned from New York and settled into a Victorian terrace in Paddington for $7.5 million.

Fashion designer Rebecca Ruby owned it 20 years before it was listed with The Agency’s Ben Collier earlier this year.

The Paddington Street terrace last traded for $1.8 million when sold by property investors Colin Gray and his architect wife Lissa, who built it, and Ruby listed it in 2016 with hopes of more than $6 million, but it never sold.