ON THE QT
What’s in store for millionaires’ golf course?
AMULTI-billionaire’s Gold Coast playground, The Villa private golf course at Nerang, quietly has changed hands but whether it will become a high-rise haven appears to be up in the air.
Brisbane group Pointcorp is believed to have settled the purchase of the riverfront property some 10 days ago but isn’t talking about it.
The property’s been sold following the 2016 death of its owner, Japanese businessman Toshiaki Ogasawara.
The 23ha holding, which is bisected by the Brisbane-Gold Coast railway line, carries development approval for 946 apartments in 10 buildings of between four and 13 levels.
That approval might look grand but the times probably aren’t right to make it a viable development proposition.
Hence it’s not surprising that there’s a quiet word around that Pointcorp might be looking at a more feet-onthe-ground plan that would include villas and townhouses.
It seems logical that the group, headed by Chris Vitale and Paul Gedoun, would have been talking to city council planning staff long before it finalised The Villa deal.
Just how much Pointcorp has paid for The Villa might never emerge.
It appears to have bought Nifsan Developments, the company through which Toshiaki held The Villa and the remaining properties at his Emerald Lakes residentialcommercial community.
Pointcorp might well have gained a bonus – Nifsan Developments is believed to hold a cache of tax losses, possibly large ones.
Interestingly, around the time that Pointcorp is believed to have settled The Villa buy, two new mortgages were taken out against that property and up to nine others in the Nifsan Developments portfolio.
One mortgage was from Suncorp-Metway and the other from CVS Lane Funding, which has former PM Julia Gillard as a nonexecutive director.
CVS is a partner with Brisbane’s Consolidated Properties on various property developments, including re-firing the stalled Pavilions Palm Beach retail-residential project.
Pointcorp has been operating for 16 years and has a $1 billion pipeline of projects and is no stranger to medium-rise residential ventures, such as those possible at The Villa.
Last year it embarked upon Bloom, a project on a Coomera site that will provide 344 homes.
Pointcorp’s new asset, The Villa, was a long-time Gold Coast retreat for Toshiaki Ogasawara.
The then publisher of the Japan Times Englishlanguage newspaper and chairman of plastic carparts maker Nifco bought the land for $6 million 29 years ago.
He built an $11 million mansion that included a driving tee off his first-floor bedroom and opened The Villa in 1994.
The mansion later was turned into offices for Nifsan and a function centre, one at which weddings included those of surfing legend Mick Fanning and of laterbankrupted ABC Learning boss Eddy Groves.
The Villa golf course was at one point offering a limited number of golf memberships at $7500 a year. The golf club was closed in 2012 – Nifsan said it was not economically viable because memberships had slumped in the wake of the GFC.