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A house ranked among Pittwater’s best new builds is hoped to reset the northern beaches house price record after it was listed this week by builder Robert Yazbek and his wife Annette for $50 million.
That figure is not a typo. Indeed, LJ Hooker’s principal David Edwards said the property owes the Yazbeks $50 million following a four-year rebuild and luxury fit-out since they paid $12,995,000 for it in 2017.
Architect Robert Burton undertook a four-year rebuild of the house that was completed in 2021.
The Avalon Beach residence on Stokes Point was originally designed by architect Rosalie Stollery for coal industry supremo Malcolm MacLennan and his partner Kim Turner before it was sold to the Yazbeks five years ago.
To its credit, architect Robert Burton undertook the latest reincarnation of the six-bedroom, seven-bathroom residence on 1600 square metres, now known as Celeste, complete with a feature staircase, interiors by Burton in collaboration with Sandra Cotter, landscaping by Space Landscape Designs, a 21-metre pool, inclinator from waterfront to street, sauna, private jetty and boatshed.
The lavish, high-spec rebuild is vying with the $40 million Palm Beach weekender of developers Bob and Margaret Rose to beat the $27.5 million record set by WiseTech billionaire Richard White in Palm Beach.
The three-level house is set on a waterfront parcel of 1600 square metres.Credit:
But the sale comes at a tumultuous time for Robert Yazbek, co-founder of embattled Atlas Construction Group.
Liquidator Bruce Gleeson, best known for his work unravelling the Ponzi scheme of missing fraudster Melissa Caddick, was handed administration of Atlas after it was embroiled in ongoing litigation with developer Fitz Jersey, a company controlled by billionaire Fortescue Metals investor Kie Chie Wong.
The dispute has ended a 30-year friendship and business relationship between Wong and Yazbek, that since 1985 has included a number of building projects, including the construction of Wong’s Maroubra home.
The dispute is centred on a 500-apartment development at Mascot, Mascot Square, at the end of which included a shareholder loan and dividends payment to Atlas directors that was later found by Justice James Stevenson to have been made “with the intention to defraud Fitz Jersey”.
Further souring their friendship is the more than $15 million owed to Wong’s investment company Fitz Jersey by the Yazbeks and their corporate interests, although that April judgement in the Supreme Court is expected to be subject to appeal.
The Victorian terrace of Graeme Wedderburn and Bella Cheung last traded in 2014 for $2.1 million.
Bob Carr’s long-time former political aide Graeme Wedderburn and his wife Bella Cheung are selling their Surry Hills terrace amid talk they are planning a tree-change.
Graeme Wedderburn is making a tree-change from his Surry Hills home.Credit:Peter Rae
The grand four-storey Victorian terrace was best described as a dilapidated dump when the couple traded in their Woollahra home to buy it in 2014 for $2.1 million, undertaking a major renovation since then.
BresicWhitney’s Guido Scatizzi has a $4.6 million guide ahead of the November 29 auction.
It’s official: this year’s highest house price sale is the Vaucluse trophy home Ganeden that was sold by lawyer John Landerer for $62.75 million in February to “Helen” Laoning Huang, wife of billionaire car dealer Yi Huang.
The Vaucluse residence Ganeden was sold by lawyer John Landerer for $62.75 million.Credit:
Sources confirm Ganeden was sold by Pillinger’s Brad Pillinger, ending a three-year sales campaign and making the Huangs a neighbour to their friend and fellow billionaire Chau Chak Wing.
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