Newslink founder Roger Wood kicks off Hawkesbury River trophy home market

Heather and Roger Wood, founders of the newsagency retail chain Newslink, had no sooner watched on in relief as their historic Lower Portland retreat remained safely above the devastating floodwaters that recently inundated the Hawkesbury River before they decided to sell.

It wasn’t the rain that caused them to rethink the property. The former managing director of Rupert Murdoch’s Herald and Weekly Times publishing group said the couple were prompted to sell and move on to new, as yet unknown, adventures given they have spent more than two decades restoring the heritage homestead, landscaping the gardens and re-establishing an extensive orchard.

A $12 million to $13 million guide by Ken Jacobs and James Hall, of Christie’s International, will no doubt make parting that much sweeter.

Venetiaville has stood as one of the area’s landmark residences since it was built in the early 1890s by world-champion sculler Peter Kemp, and rebuilt as a single-storey sandstone cottage after a fire in 1904.

The Bondi Beach-based Woods purchased the 20-hectare property in 1998 for $1.1 million and commissioned a major extension and renovation in 2006 by architect Timothy Moon, complete with a pool, a guest house and a separate studio.

Moon is no stranger to the Hawkesbury River’s trophy homes, having also designed billionaire Brett Blundy’s holiday home, Sweven, upriver that was sold in 2017 for $18.75 million to one of China’s richest men, “Jeremy” Jianmin Song.

Venetiaville’s sales campaign follows the recent $12 million sale of nearby retreat Sentry Rock, which was built by the late businessman and insider trader Rene Rivkin in the late 1990s.

According to the local rumour mill, the deep pockets behind the sale belong to software billionaire Richard White, the former AC/DC guitar technician who founded logistics giant WiseTech Global.

Indeed, the property settled into a company of which one of the co-directors is former WiseTech head of legal, Stratos Karousos, who is also a director of another investment vehicle that bought a $31 million industrial site in Mascot, also tipped as a purchase by Mr White.

But in the absence of any comment from the agents involved or from Mr White, the new owner of Sentry Rock will remain a mystery, of sorts.

Former PM heads south

Former prime minister Paul Keating has bought a South Coast getaway in Gerringong for more than $2.7 million.

The three-bedroom house was snapped up after only eight days on the market and for well above the $2.1 million to $2.3 million guide offered by Stone Real Estate’s Helena and Greg Crumpton, thanks to bullish competition in a runaway market.

The property was built and long-owned by the late butcher Bruce Elvy and his widow Lynette, who bought it as a vacant block in 1988 for $40,000.

Mr Keating, who was PM from 1991 to 1996, is based in Sydney’s inner city, but still owns the historic Queen Anne-style residence St Kevin’s in Woollahra with his former wife Annita van Iersel.

Bouris clan cash out of Double Bay

Businessman Mark Bouris and his former wife Katherine Bouris are selling an investment apartment in Double Bay’s 1788 development just months after they settled on the off-the-plan purchase.

Despite separating in 2005 the former couple purchased the two-bedroom spread in the Bates Smart-designed complex in a company name with their two sons Alexander and Nicholas for $3.7 million in 2017.

Sources say it was meant to replace Katherine’s Kurraba Point home she sold two years ago for $3.95 million but, given she no longer wants to make a permanent return to the eastern suburbs, it has instead been returned to the market for $3.5 million to $3.8 million through Ray White’s Patrick Cosgrove.

Palm Beach downsize for stockbroker

The Palm Beach prestige market is not to be left out of the school holiday rush. Take the weekender of stockbroker Brent Potts and his wife Pauline on offer for $10.5 million to $11.5 million through LJ Hooker’s Peter Robinson.

Potts bought the Florida Road getaway – directly behind Gretel Packer’s weekender – for $7 million in 2007 when he and his fellow senior executives at Southern Cross Equities were in negotiations to sell the broking operation for $150 million.

The couple’s downsizing plans go back to last October when they listed their Rose Bay home, Villa Florida for $45 million given the kids have long moved out of the seven-bedroom home.

And in coming days the LJ Hooker Palm Beach principal David Edwards launches the getaway of Angela Fleming, widow of the grocery tycoon Jim Fleming, hits the market for $9.9 million, complete with an indoor swimming pool and a water fountain that spouts from a poolside table.

The hilltop residence with extraordinary north-facing views to Barrenjoey Lighthouse last traded in 2007 for $6.55 million when sold by entrepreneur Simon Tripp.

Friends in royal places

Edward Dawson-Damer, a family friend to the Royal family and former equerry to the late Queen Mother, and his wife Joanne Grant are selling their Vaucluse home for $6.6 million.

There are plans to move closer to schools nearer the city, but only once the property is sold by Richardson & Wrench Double Bay’s Michael Dunn and Andrew Birbeck.

Dawson-Damer, the son of the seventh Earl of Portarlington, George Dawson-Damer, and a director of the Keswick Development company that sold Queensland’s Keswick Island in 2019 to China Bloom, purchased the five-bedroom house with a pool in 2004 for $3.3 million.

Odds on Queens Park sale

Bookie Nick O’Connell is selling his Queens Park home he bought from INXS drummer Jon Farriss and his wife Kerry three years ago.

O’Connell, a former director of now defunct online bookmaker Pinnacle, paid $5.1 million for the parkside house before demolishing the recording studio at the rear to make way for a self-contained studio above the garage.

Ray White Woollahra’s Ausgusto Gerocarni is asking $6.5 million ahead of the May 8 auction.