Clifftop gem a snip at $8.5m
Huge interest in financier’s home includes expats willing to buy sight unseen — agent
We’ve had over 100 inquiries since Christmas, from here and overseas, and a couple of parties are seriously interested. John Greenwood, Bayleys
Aluxury multimillion-dollar estate overlooking the Pacific Ocean is attracting “tremendous” buyer interest, including from expats who are prepared to buy sight unseen.
Kauri Mountain Pt, which sits on 10.15ha on its own peninsula at Whanga¯rei Heads, has a price tag of $8.5 million.
It is being sold by Kiwi financier John Fulton, who is waiting out the Covid crisis on the Mediterranean island of Ibiza.
Bayleys agent John Greenwood, who is marketing the property along with Irene Bremner and Bayleys managing director Mike Bayley, said he had been inundated with buyer inquiries since December 21.
“There’s been a tremendous response since we started marketing this just before Christmas. We’ve had expats from Australia and the USA who would possibly look at buying this sight unseen,” Greenwood told OneRoof.
“We’ve had over 100 inquiries since Christmas, from here and overseas, and a couple of parties are seriously interested. So if anybody reading this likes the idea of owning this wonderful piece of paradise they should get in now, before it’s too late.”
The property features two luxury dwellings, one of which is rented out to guests through a boutique lodging company for more than $2000 a night.
The main residence, Te Whara, is a three-bedroom sturdy rural shed-like structure designed by noted Kiwi architect Andrew Patterson. The onebedroom lodge, called the Glasshouse but also known as the “lover’s cottage”, was designed by Paul Clarke of Studio2 Architects in 2010 and boasts a separate glass-walled bath house that overlooks the bush and sea.
Fulton, who has worked in the finance sector here and around the world, said from his base in Ibiza that the decision to sell Kauri Mountain Pt had been a difficult one for his family as it was their dream home, but they had done so because the Covid-19 pandemic had made international travel all but impossible.
Fulton said he had been smitten when he first saw the property in 2015.
“It wasn’t even a sunny day; in fact there was a major tropical cyclone happening, but even in the wind and rain, the rugged landscape and the views towards Great Barrier, Little Barrier and the Bay of Islands were so magnificent, I decided then and there to buy it,” he said. “Whenever I’m there, I just switch off completely.”
He said New Zealand’s handling of the pandemic had burnished its international reputation and would make it all the more attractive to tourists post-Covid.
“More and more people who’ve admired and envied us our fairly normal lives during this strange time will be excited to come and see the country, in person,” he said.
If Kauri Mountain Pt sells for $8.5m, it would be Northland’s biggest sale of the past 12 months. OneRoof figures show last year’s highest settled sale in the region in 2020 was $7m. —
Louise