Palm Haven at Palm Beach sold for $21 million
The $21 million sale of a Phillip Cox-designed beachfront home at Palm Beach, on Sydney's pricey peninsular, has buoyed market sentiment at the docile top end of the property market.
The trophy home, bought by an eastern suburbs family as a weekender, ranks as the third priciest sale so far this year.
There were initial bullish $23 million hopes for Palm Haven, the vast Barrenjoey Road estate of Phillip Esplin, the late lawyer and founder of Esplins Solicitors.
There have only been two known higher sales in Sydney's east, at Vaucluse and Rose Bay with agents complaining activity have been very subdued this year.
The sale comes after the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that Sydney's overall house sales activity fell to just 12,000 in the March quarter – the lowest level since 2002.
"The Sydney listings story is going to be an interesting one to watch over the next few months," CoreLogic property researcher Cameron Kusher said, noting the trend had continued through autumn and into the seasonal winter slowdown.
"Housing sentiment has improved and auction clearance rates have lifted yet newly advertised properties for sale are continuing to trend lower," Kusher noted.
The Palm Beach offering had been in the Esplin family name since the late 1980s when they spent $900,000 on one block before spending a further $1.3 million next door to create the sprawling 2,075 sqm waterfront property.
Cox designed the double brick and timber home in 1990 to win the HIA Award for Design and Building Excellence.
The Australian style home features a number of formal and casual living and dining areas which open to deep verandahs.
It has one of the few tennis courts in the suburb.
LJ Hooker Palm Beach agent David Edwards had the listing.
The Palm Beach record stands at $24 million when Gretel Packer secured the family bungalow which was handed to her as part of the breakup of her father, the late media tycoon Kerry Packer's, vast fortune.
The biggest transacted home sale come in 2012 when Kalua, the luxury $22 million property nearby which was bought by car dealer Laurie Sutton in 2012 for the trophy home, Kalua.
Kalua also has a tennis court.
Palm Beach's most recent prestige sale was to Goldman Sachs managing director Zac Fletcher who spent $10.35 million on Snapperman Beach through David Edwards, of LJ Hooker Palm Beach.
The widow of the late AC/DC guitarist Malcolm Young, O’Linda Young, bought a beachfront house on Snapperman Beach in 2015 for more than $10 million. The property baron Stephen Burcher bought last year for $12 million.
This article was first published in the Daily Telegraph.