Small Acreage Snapped Up

Newcastle Herald

Saturday December 4, 2004

SALLY CROXTON

IT was a country mile above most properties in the district and was snapped up at the full asking price of $1.4 million by the first lookers.

The sale of the fine post-Federation property Leeholme at 46a Paterson Road, Woodville, creates a record for a small acreage in the Maitland district, exceeding the colonial Wallalong House on a similarly sized lot near Hinton that fetched $1.15 million in September.

Leeholme stands on 3.46 hectares on a sweeping curve of the Paterson River.

Owned by Mornington Peninsula-bound Robert and Lynda Burke, it sold to a family from Gresford.

The 1920s-built brick house, which was doubled in size in the 1980s, was built on the site of a grand Pender-designed 1882 mansion built for draper and mayor of Maitland John Lee and demolished in 1919.

Selling agent Pamela Munson of Paterson Valley Farms and Acreages said she put one ad in The Herald and it sold off that.

"It was just the most glorious place with an amazing garden including a 160-year-old oak tree," she said.

Ms Munson said small acreages in the Paterson, Gresford and Dungog area had doubled in price in the past two years with those on the Chichester, Williams, Allyn and Paterson rivers particularly in demand.

It is not just the smaller acreages making strong gains. Last week she sold the former dairy farm Evora at 890 Chichester Dam Road, Bandon Grove, near Dungog, for $1.225 million (the asking price was $1.45 million) to a semi-retired vascular surgeon from Sydney.

The 58-hectare property with frontage to the Williams River last sold to the Evans family from the Central Coast for $700,000 21/2 years ago.

Beach frenzy

THE feeding frenzy around Catherine Hill Bay shows no signs of abating.

After last month's sale of a miner's cottage at 9 Clarke Street for a record $1.275 million the mystery buyer, who some say is a Sydney lawyer and others a film director, is said to have gone to a neighbouring cottage and offered a similar amount to secure it, but was refused.

Jamie Lovett of Global Property International, who auctioned the property, said the buyer was in the movie industry and was talking about some future development in the oceanside village.

A few days ago Global listed 58 Flowers Drive and has already got a deposit for a sale in the $700,000s on the cottage.

Mr Lovett said he had issued seven contracts for 1920 square metres of beachfront land with a timber chapel used as a bunkhouse in the area that surfers call "the graveyard".

"It's being sold by expressions of interest of $1 million-plus and that doesn't seem to scare them," he said.

Catherine Hill Bay was so popular that inquiry made up about 20 per cent of Global's Belmont office requests.

Another record

IT went privately but the record land sale has still become the whisper on Merewether's beachside.

The Parer family's 1 Janet Street, close to the beach and with great coastal views, has sold for the fantastic price of $1.5 million, a record for the lower area of popular Merewether.

The Newcastle businessman who bought the property is planning to redevelop the 710 square metre site and live there, making the price land value only.

The previous record for the Merewether flat was set earlier this year when a 558 sq metre block at 10 Coane Street fetched $1.305 million.

Building award

A NATIONAL building award has gone to Bellevale Home's Clovelly Mk 2 Georgian on display at Somerset Park. It won the National Master Builders Association Excellence in Housing Awards for the best display home under $150,000.

Ross Street offering

FOR the first time in about five years there's a waterfront for sale in Ross Street, Belmont, and it's going to auction today at 2pm.

(That is not counting the McCloy family home that went on the market briefly before being withdrawn.)

By midweek there were already five contracts out on 132 Ross Street.

Jason Maxwell from LJ Hooker Newcastle is expecting plenty of action today for the 1950s house on a 923 square metre lot with elevated water views.

That will follow what Mr Maxwell is tipping to be a lively auction at 18 Seacourt Avenue, Dudley, at noon when the superb five-bedroom home set on 1510 square metres belonging to Queensland-bound Price Waterhouse Coopers partner Martin Linz and his wife Jenny goes under the hammer.

It is in a rainforest-like setting in one of Dudley's best streets.