Source : the age
The Whale Beach clifftop mansion designed and constructed by Jennifer Hawkins and her builder husband, Jake Wall, has settled for $30 million to a mystery buyer.
Settlement documents this month reveal a shelf company, Rayner Property Holdings Pty Ltd, paid exactly $30 million to Hawkins, a former Miss Universe, and Wall, the director of J Group Projects.
A put and call option on the title was previously made on behalf of the mystery buyer by finance entrepreneur Simon Tripp.
Daniel Appleby, a managing director at Speed and Stracey Lawyers, is now representing the buyer. Appleby’s job description on the company’s website is described in part as addressing tax issues and estate and succession planning for successful Australian families.
This masthead exclusively revealed in February 2022 that word had leaked on a structured deal on the property totalling $30 million, part of which was for the land and the rest for the residence once completed. The property sold in April 2024 and has now settled.
Hawkins and Wall purchased the double block, once owned by the late Dame Joan Sutherland, for $6.95 million in 2020 from Museum of Contemporary Art chair Lorraine Tarabay, records show.
Grand plans to demolish the 1950s house were approved in April 2021 to make way for a new four-storey residence with a half basketball court at a cost of more than $3 million.
The mega-mansion has at least five bedrooms and also comes with a pool, spa, outdoor bar, wine room, mud room, games room, bowling alley and home office. Wellness zones include a sauna and cold plunge, as well as a dedicated health spa.
The $30 million sale is a suburb record, topping the $14.3 million paid in 2023 for a five-bedroom, six-bathroom home. Veteran merchant banker Mike Crivelli and his wife, Susie, sold the abode to Renato Coneliano, executive director and marketing director of chemical supplier Redox, and his wife, Catherine.
Hawkins and Wall have also listed their Terrigal manor for $6 million, the same price they paid for it in 2021.
The seven-bedroom, four-bathroom property is on nine acres, with lagoon frontage, and offers views towards Avoca Beach.
There are formal and casual living spaces, timber floors, a stone kitchen, French windows and doors.
The home is being sold through Mat Steinwede and Whitney Wilson of McGrath Terrigal.
Kristy Johnson is a prestige property reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald.
