Key points
- Socialite Heidi Onisforou has relisted her Potts Point spread in Rockwall.
- Tom Waterhouse scored a win in the Land and Environment Court.
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Peter Placek escaped the Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia in the 1960s only to arrive in Australia with virtually nothing, making ends meet by playing jazz at RSL clubs.
The former rag trader-turned-importer has not done too badly since, with word this week he has sold his Point Piper waterfront house for about $30 million.
The home of Peter Placek set at the far end of Lady Martins Beach has sold for about $30 million.Credit:Domain
Placek’s rags-to-riches story was first profiled in the late 1980s in The Sydney Morning Herald, although his business interests are now focused on his kitchen and bathroom finishes business IDW Design.
Records show Placek purchased the three-level house with four bedrooms, a pool and private jetty on prized Wolseley Crescent in 2008 for $10.5 million from International Publishing Group chief Philip Greader.
Peter Placek arrived in Australia in the 1960s with virtually nothing and by the late 1980s had made his name as a successful ragtrader.Credit:Fairfax Media
It was a trade-up at the time from his former Bellevue Hill home that sold in 2005 for $8.35 million (that house resold last year for just shy of $20 million).
Gag orders on Placek’s latest sale mean the exact price and buyer will be left to settlement, but sources say the deal was negotiated by The Agency’s Steven Chen, who was tight-lipped on the deal.
Placek’s son and IDW Design co-director Martin Placek bought an apartment a few doors along on Lady Martins Beach last July for $4.73 million from magazine maven Deborah Thomas.
The eastern suburbs’ trophy home market has been in a cycle of self-inflicted starvation in recent months as potential vendors opt out of selling because they can’t find anything to buy.
There was one other significant deal to give agents hope this week, though. Steven Chen also sold the grand, Luigi Rosselli-designed mansion in Bellevue Hill of prefab building entrepreneur Nick Leos and his wife, Emma.
The Luigi Rosselli-redesigned residence of Nick and Emma Leos sold this week for $26.5 million.
The sale has become a case study in getting the price right given that it was originally listed for $38 million until Chen took over the listing earlier this month with a $28 million guide and sold it on Tuesday for what a source said was $26.5 million.
In Mosman, former UBS boss Brad Orgill sold his Clifton Gardens house. Ray White Mosman’s Geoff Smith had a $10 million guide, and it is expected to have come close to that, roughly doubling the $5.2 million he paid for it in 2015.
Insolvency guru Vaughan Strawbridge and his partner, Kylie Maddern, also did quick work on the sale of their historic Cremorne home, Dalkeith. DiJones’ Piers van Hamburg wouldn’t reveal the sale price but was asking $9.5 million.
Flipper’s jewel
Jeweller-turned-property flipper Heidi Onisforou returned her glamorous Potts Point spread to the market this week with $9.9 million hopes.
Heidi Onisforou has listed her Rockwall apartment for $9.9 million.Credit:
This is the Rockwall apartment she bought for $4.4 million in 2016 on the back of her then record $13 million terrace house flip around the corner.
Onisforou then gutted the apartment soon after and redesigned it in collaboration with Tim Alison Associates to create a three-bedroom spread with 3.2 metre-high ceilings, sliding glass walls and high-end finishes throughout.
Heidi Onisforou is planning another renovation project.Credit:Anthony Johnson
It was listed in 2018 with a $9 million guide, but when it didn’t sell she instead sold her nearby terrace renovation for $5.5 million to logistics expert David Knight.
Given a hankering for another renovation project and something with more grass, it is listed with Richardson & Wrench’s Jason Boon and Ray White’s Renee Cross.
TV boss downsizes
Long-time television boss Ian Holmes and his wife, Anne, don’t tend to stay long in their various Northern Beaches homes, so it is perhaps not surprising that they have listed their Manly penthouse with a $7 million guide.
The former Seven chairman who ran Grundy’s for almost 20 years purchased the harbourside apartment in 2017 for $5.8 million and two years later sold their Palm Beach home, Semloh Cove, for $12.5 million.
The four-bedroom penthouse of Anne and Ian Holmes goes to auction on October 19.Credit:
The renovated four-bedroom apartment goes to auction on October 19 through Belle’s Anthony Calacoci.
Mosman’s neighbourhood watch
Bookie-turned-stock picker Tom Waterhouse has had a win after the Land and Environment Court gave the go-ahead to build his lavish Luigi Rosselli-designed home on Balmoral Beach at a cost of $4 million.
Tom Waterhouse scored approval to rebuild his Mosman home this week despite objections from 19 of his neighbours.Credit:Louie Douvis
Waterhouse and his wife, Hoda, own one of only a handful of beachfront houses in Mosman, having purchased their architect Ian Reeler-designed house in 2014 for $13 million.
Their DA to demolish it and rebuild a two-storey residence with five bedrooms, four living areas, swimming pool and cabana elicited 19 objections from locals, all objecting to either the scale or impact on their views, but to no avail.
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