Chinese inspect Tukurua, the iconic $50 million Cottesloe trophy mansion

Chinese inspect Tukurua, the iconic $50 million Cottesloe trophy mansion
Jonathan ChancellorDecember 7, 2020

Tukurua, the 21 room 1890s Cottesloe gold boom summer beach mansion, has speculative $50 million plus expectations.

It's not just the restored heritage listed home but rather the 5,000 square metre block with its undeveloped beachfront potential.

Tukurua was built in 1896 as the summer residence of Western Australia’s first attorney-general, Sir Septimus Burt, handsome double storey residence sited on a gently sloping block on the corner of Rosendo Street and Marine Terrace. 

Burt's home was a substantial house, Strawberry Hill, in Adelaide Terrace, which had originally been owned by the Stone family but was purchased by Archibald Burt and extended by the prominent architect J. Talbot Hobbs to accommodate Septimus's large family of ten children ranging in ages from four to twenty-three years.

Septimus also owned a riverside holiday home in Peppermint Grove, from which the family cruised the Swan River in their own steam boat Titu, one of only two in the colony.

In 1896, Burt commissioned a second holiday home from architect, R. T. McMasters, to be built in the newly fashionable, beach area of Cottesloe.

Around 1933, one of the Burt children rented the property to the Cass family, whose bed and breakfast made sufficient profit to then buy the property in 1939. During World War II, it served as military headquarters for officers and then as a home for refugee families after the fall of Singapore.

Their daughter, Dorothea Cass left it to her friend of many decades Ted Smith in 1994, when it was valued at $4 million. It has had a $5 million six year renovation.

The grand mansion, with 10 bedrooms and six bathrooms, at 1-9 Rosendo Street, has been listed through Frank Torre, at House Real Estate, Cottesloe.

Already there has been Chinese buyer interest.

“Most of the interest has come out of China, with people looking at buying a trophy home or developing the whole site,” Mr Torre told the local Post paper.

“We’ve had one group fly down from China to have a look at it, and another is arriving this weekend.” 

Torre says the front could be subdivided into five or six blocks, with each of the approximately 300 square metre sites priced at about $3.6 million. 

The median house price in Cottesloe sits at around $1.76 million, according to RP Data. 

Jonathan Chancellor

Jonathan Chancellor is one of Australia's most respected property journalists, having been at the top of the game since the early 1980s. Jonathan co-founded the property industry website Property Observer and has written for national and international publications.

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