Max Whitby moves up Macleay Street after selling $12.5 million Villard, Potts Point sub-penthouse

Singer-songwriter Delta Goodrem is still inspecting pricey inner-city apartments, but is yet to commit to her next Sydney bolthole.

Her recent sightings have been mostly around Elizabeth Bay and Potts Point. She looked at the Tara penthouse that was snapped up on Friday, but not by Goodrem, apparently for $4 million-plus.

The 358 square metre apartment, once an illegal gambling den, sold after its first official open for inspection through Anthony Birdsall and Vicki Laing at Laing Real Estate.

Located on the seventh floor, the three-bedroom Greenknowe Ave apartment with wraparound garden was sold by retired estate agent Peter Thane, who had bought it in 2000 from the writer Ruth Ritchie for $1.1 million.

Goodrem was papped ­recently going into the apartment block for a private showing, so it hardly met her prerequisite of being pap-proof.

There’s also been a sighting of her at The Palms apartment block on the harbourfront at Elizabeth Bay.

But Goodrem decided against the two-bedroom apartment that’s listed for $4.75 million, suggesting to the agents that the paparazzi could take photos from the water. Local agents say she has gone quiet, though not because she has bought.

It was a busy week for sales in the area. Racehorse owner Max Whitby sold his $12.5 million Villard, Potts Point, penthouse, and immediately bought across the street.

Whitby, whose horse Graff finished fifth in The Everest earlier this month, spent $5.2 million to buy in Ikon, also on Macleay Street.

The Kris Lees-trained colt was beaten by half a length into fifth by Le Romain. That cost him $220,000, with fourth receiving a whopping $820,000 and fifth $600,000

The 185 square metre apartment, styled by Amgad Kamel, had sold only six months ago at $5 million when offloaded by Mike Crivelli and his wife Sue, who had paid $2.95 million in 2012.

Whitby’s 346 square metre whole seventh-floor Villard sub-penthouse had cost $6.6 million in 2012 in the Ercole ­Palazzetti-designed complex.

It was the three bedroom three bathroom apartment offered recently as a $5000 a week rental through Ray White Double Bay.

Whitby’s apartment was also previously owned by David Kunde, who sold it to the Harris family in 2006 for $7,387,500.

Its first owner was the late interior designer Garth Barnett who bought it off the plan in 1998 for $2.15 million and sold it the following year for $3.55 million.

The three-bedroom sub-penthouse of the Villard sold for $12.5 million ranks second only to the $15 million paid in 2012 by liquor industry pioneer John Piven-Large for the nearby Pomeroy penthouse and a separate apartment below.

Whitby came cross the neighbourhood in the late 1960s when he first worked for the restaurateur Bernie Houghton.

This article was first published in the Sunday Telegraph.