BBC correspondent Michael Peschardt purchases at Great Mackerel Beach

Michael Peschardt, one of the BBC's longest serving foreign correspondents, and wife Sarah have bought a weekender at Great Mackerel Beach.

The long-time Newport residents have spent $1.56 million on a 1960s beachfront that was offered for the first time.

Ray White Palm Beach agents Noel Nicholson and Shane Clinton called it the classic Aussie holiday house, "the one from your childhood".

It's one of a limited number of original houses on the prized Mackerel Beach beachfront, only metres from the jetty.

The main timber cottage on the near 700 square metre parcel has three bedrooms and an open plan living, dining and kitchen area.

There's guest quarters with another living area and two bedrooms.

Peschardt has been based in Sydney since 1990, reporting on Australasia and most countries in the Asia region.

He's covered stories from Olympic Games to wars in Cambodia, Tiger waves in New Guinea to global warming in Fiji.

March 2000 Michael began hosting and producing Australia Direct, a 30 minute programme transmitting monthly on BBC World, the BBC's 24 hour international news and information channel.

The couple have been in Newport since 1999 when they paid $1,325,000 for the home of the late ad-man and creative director Christen Monge.