Collins’ luxury home sells
Destiny Church leader Brian Tamaki has vacated the luxury holiday pad of Corrections Minister Judith Collins after she sold the Pohutukawa Coast bolt-hole for nearly $2 million.
Collins listed the six-bedroom, four-bathroom mansion for sale two years ago hoping to get “north of $2m”. But it was passed in at auction for $1.9m in November 2014 after receiving just a single bid. In June last year the Weekend
Herald revealed that Tamaki — a self-anointed bishop of the controversial conservative church — was renting Collins’ swanky Omana Heights Drive digs with his wife Hannah after selling their own luxury house across the road for $1.5m.
The Tamakis’ old 450sq m fivebedroom house featured elevator access to its three levels, a sauna, gymnasium, heated swimming pool and its own security fences and gates. Collins’ beach retreat is smaller than the Tamakis’ former abode, at just 415sq m — about twice the size of the average Kiwi home.
It is constructed from tilt slab concrete and features three lounge areas, an outdoor entertainer’s kitchen, theatre room, two gas fires, remote-controlled LED lighting and panoramic views of the Hauraki Gulf.
Property records show Collins and her husband, Oravida director David Wong-Tung, finally sold the house through Barfoot & Thompson in March for $1.9m — the same price they had refused to accept
two years ago.
They purchased the retreat in 2006 for $1.17m, according to QV.
It means they pocketed $730,000 in capital gain from the sale — about $73,000 a year, $22,000 more than Auckland’s annual median wage.
The Herald on Sunday sent questions to Collins asking whether she was happy with the selling price, if Tamaki had been a good tenant, and whether she had declared the $730,000 windfall to IRD for tax purposes. She did not respond. A neighbour told the Herald on
Sunday Tamaki moved out of Collins’ house several months ago but was now living in another property just down the street.
“He’s a couple of doors down. To my knowledge he’s renting.”
The man said he had little to do with the Tamakis when they were living in Collins’ house. “I seldom saw them.” Questions put to Destiny Church also went unanswered.