Chips Rafferty Pittwater home, Laffing Waters sells

Laffing Waters, the former Pittwater retreat of knockabout Australian actor Chips Rafferty, set on a 2,538-square-metre block at Lovett Bay north of Sydney, has been sold. 

The deep waterfront bushland property, which is accessible only by water, has been sold by the Dunn family after 28 years of ownership, and four years of seeking a buyer.

It is a vastly different home than the rustic one Rafferty, otherwise known as John Goffage, and his wife, Ellen, had in the late 1940s. The rugged movie star of The Overlanders, a tale about the hardships of Australian outback life, had paid £1,205 for the land and built the home amid the waterfront towering gums.

The Dunn family purchased the first of their two Sturdee Place holdings, now with beach and jetty, in the late 1980s for $550,000. 

Much changed but the backyard still has Chip's leftover beer bottles! Raffety’s own display wall of beer bottles, some bearing the date 1952. Around $3.55 million was being sought by Deborah Cullen at Unique Estates for the four bedroom offering.

The buyers from the inner west were getting their boat licence last week.