Billabong Station fetches $8.8 million plus in strong start to spring sales
Billabong Station, the 1,875-hectare Wagga Wagga district cropping and pastoral property, was passed in at recent auction at $8.8 million but sold the next day.
It was listed by the Sydney lawyer and property group director David Baffsky after 31 years as the family's farming enterprise.
There were three bidding parties for the property, which had been listed with $9 million plus hopes. There were seven registered bidders.
The Eastern Riverina property had previously been in the Beveridge family for 76 years.
The listing reflected a change in emphasis for Baffsky and his wife, Helen, who spent $6 million late last year on Runnymede, an 18-hectare property at Glenquarry in the NSW Southern Highlands through Bowral agent Drew Lindsay.
The Wagga Wagga district property, which is 90% arable, has a diversified production including cattle breeding, fat lamb production and soft commodities including cereals, lupins and canola.
“It is arguably one of the best developed agricultural holdings in the region,” its listing agent Chris Meares of Meares and Associates says. It has been listed in conjunction with Bill Schulz at Landmark Harcourts Wagga Wagga.
Billabong is rated at 25,000 dry sheep equivalents with up to 1,417 hectare sown to cash and fodder crops each year.
Some 500 hectares of crop was given in with the sale.
The property, with Billabong Creek frontage, comes with a five-bedroom homestead plus additional houses. The homestead was renovated in 1979 and extended in 2007 with additional accommodation.
It has a six-stand woolshed, four sets of sheep yards, and two sets of cattle yards.