As another interest rate rise was handed down on Tuesday, over in Centennial Park philanthropist and gallerist Dr Gene Sherman was finalising the sale of her historic mansion for $26.5 million.
The bullish sale result lends weight to the oft-cited claim that Sydney’s trophy home market is impervious to rising interest rates.
Despite the cash rate now sitting at 4.35 per cent, more than 40 properties across Sydney have traded in the rarefied $20 million-plus range this year alone.
Sherman’s 1918-built Federation mansion, known as Braelin at 44-46 Lang Road, has long been touted as arguably the best house locally, thanks in part to the grandeur of the residence that was built by architect Donald Esplin, as well as its double lot totalling 2200 square metres.
Listing: see more images here of the property
It has set a suburb high the past three times it sold, all by The Agency’s Ben Collier: first in 2015 at $12 million when purchased by Atlassian software boss Mike Cannon-Brookes, again in 2018 at $16.5 million when purchased by Sherman, and this week for an almost 30 per cent gain in value at $26.5 million.
The buyer remains undisclosed but was introduced to the property by Simon Cohen, of Cohen Handler buyer’s agency.
Until last year Centennial Park had never recorded a sale in the $20 million range.
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That changed in February when Aussie Home Loan heiress Deborah Symond O’Neil and her husband Ned O’Neil paid $20.5 million for a house up the road from Braelin, and was matched a few months later when fund manager Doug Tynan bought a few doors away, also on Lang Road.
The latest sale price is $10 million more than Sherman paid for the house in 2018, reflecting a capital gain of $2 million each year she owned it.
Sherman is bound for Woollahra, where she recently paid $13 million for a house.
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Braelin was purchased by Sherman and her late husband, co-founder of investment house Equitilink Brian Sherman, who died a year ago, aged 79.
At the time they reconfigured the floorplan to turn what was a six-bedroom home into a two-bedroom residence with countless sitting rooms.
The property also comes with a studio where Dr Sherman runs her philanthropic foundation, and a separate gym and teenager’s pavilion with a self-contained flat above it.
This article was originally published in The Sydney Morning Herald.
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