The concrete-and-steel house, last owned by Peter Woodland of Barbeques Galore, has Pacific Ocean views and a helicopter hanger
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The home of an Australian businessman who died tragically in a helicopter crash in 2022 is on the market with a A$9 million (US$5.9 million) price guide.
Peter Woodland, the late director of Barbeques Galore who purchased the expansive family estate just north of Sydney in 2017, was killed in April 2022, when his helicopter crashed in the Snowy Mountains in New South Wales. He was 75.
Woodland, who was a keen pilot and even installed a helicopter hanger and helipad at the residence, bought the home from acclaimed landscape photographer Richard Green, who built the unique property in Terrey Hills in the 1990s. He also died in a helicopter crash in 2015 .
The vast five-bedroom house is located in a lush native bushland setting off Mona Vale Road.
“Sitting right on the cliff’s edge, it looks right out over the bush to the water, and its proximity to the beach and even the city means it’s pretty special,” said listing agent Shayne Hutton of Sydney Country Living, which listed the home earlier this month.
Walls of fireproof glass and dozens of skylights with electronically operated Vergolas mean the natural landscape acts as a dramatic backdrop to every room. The neighbouring national park and 5 acres of landscaped gardens are met with panoramic views stretching to the Pacific Ocean.
“It’s really country living in the city. That’s the only way to describe it. This place is perfect for anyone who is just sick of crowds and wants to get away, even if it’s as a secondary property they’ll use as a weekender,” he added.
The concrete-and-steel trophy home has a Travertine-tiled entrance foyer with 20ft ceilings which leads through to two separate wings; one for living and another for sleeping. With a choice of everyday spaces, each living zone has sweeping district views and doors to the wraparound veranda.
In addition to casual living and dining rooms, there are formal entertaining areas, a library, a home office or extra family room, a professional photographer’s darkroom plus a large artist’s studio that could also be used as a poolside cabana with wet bar.
The granite kitchen has Gaggenau appliances, a grand island bench, a walk-in pantry, and an adjoining central courtyard with water features, perfect for a chef’s herb and vegetable garden.
While two bedrooms sit on the ground floor, four more occupy the upstairs accommodation level including a palatial primary suite. This parents’ retreat has a balcony, a vast dressing room plus walk-in wardrobe and a deluxe ensuite with freestanding bathtub, a double shower and twin vanities. One other bedroom features an ensuite and two more share a full family bathroom and powder room.
Outside, there are multiple entertaining terraces and courtyards, but the icing on the cake is the solar-heated pool and sun deck. Then the property’s standout feature is its state-of-the-art helipad with a fully incorporated turntable and a full-size helicopter hangar. Above the helipad, there is also a treetop viewing platform.
“A lot of people who might live on a farm have helicopters or just want the convenience to get in from the airport. It’s a great feature of the home and could be used for a variety of uses. For buyers without a helicopter, it could be an ideal car showroom,” Hutton said.
Additional features of the Terrey Hills residence include remote-controlled lock-up garages for up to five cars, storerooms, a wine cellar, ducted air conditioning, a security alarm and video intercom.
The Sydney sanctuary is surrounded by walking and biking trails, is a short drive to the transport and shopping hub of Chatswood and is an approximate 15-minute drive to local beaches.
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What a quarter-million dollars gets you in the western capital.
Alexandre de Betak and his wife are focusing on their most personal project yet.
New amenities, from a gym to a movie theatre, and a good commuter location filled this suburban office tower
3 min
Manhattan’s office-vacancy rate climbed to more than 15% this year, a record high. About 80 miles away in Philadelphia, occupancy also is at historically low levels. But a 24-storey office tower located between the two cities has more than doubled its occupancy over the past five years.
Developer American Equity Partners bought the New Jersey office tower, known as 1 Tower Center, for $38 million in 2019. At the time, the 40-year-old building felt dated. It had no gym, tenant lounge or car-charging stations. The low price enabled the firm to spend more than $20 million overhauling and luring tenants to the 435,000-square-foot property.
Now, the suburban building is nearly fully leased at competitive rents, mopping up tenants from other buildings after the owner added a new lobby, movie theatre, golf simulator, fitness centre and a tenant lounge featuring arcade games and ping-pong tables.
“Our tenants told us what they needed in order to fill up their offices,” said David Elkouby , a co-founder of American Equity, which owns about 4 million square feet of New Jersey office space.
The new owner also liked the location at the 14-acre hotel and conference-centre complex, off the New Jersey Turnpike’s Exit 9 in East Brunswick. The site is a relatively short commute for millions of workers in central New Jersey and is passed by 160,000 vehicles daily.
The property’s turnaround shows how office buildings can thrive even during dismal times for most of the U.S. office market, where vacancies remain much higher than pre pandemic.
Success often requires an ideal location—one that shortens the commute time of employees used to working at home—and the sort of upgrades and amenities companies say are necessary to lure employees back to the workspace.
One Vanderbilt, a deluxe office tower with a Michelin-star chef’s restaurant and plenty of outdoor space in Midtown Manhattan, is fully leased while charging some of the highest rents in the country.
The 11-story Entrada office building, in Culver City, Calif., is making the same formula work on the other coast. It opened two years ago with a sky deck, concierge services and recessed balconies. A restaurant is in the works. The owner said this month that it has signed three of the largest leases in the Los Angeles area this year.
1 Tower Center shows how the strategy can be effective even in less glamorous suburban locations. The tower is prospering while neighbouring buildings that are harder to reach with outdated facilities and poor food options struggle to fill desks even at reduced rents.
The recent interest-rate cut and reports that some big companies such as Amazon .com are re-instituting a five-day office workweek have raised hopes that the office market might be getting closer to turning.
But with more than 900 million square feet of vacant space nationwide and remote work still weighing on office demand, more creditors are seizing properties that are in default on debt payments.
Rates are still much higher than they were when tens of billions of dollars of office loans were made, and much of that debt is now maturing. The recent interest-rate cut doesn’t mean “office-sector woes are now over,” said Ermengarde Jabir, director of economic research for Moody’s commercial real-estate division.
Lenders are dumping distressed properties at steep discounts to what the buildings were worth before the pandemic. Some buyers are trying to compete simply by cutting their rents.
“Most owners don’t have the wherewithal to do what is required,” said Jamie Drummond, the Newmark senior managing director who is 1 Tower Center’s leasing agent. “Owners positioned to highly amenitise their buildings are the ones who are successful.”
HCLTech, a global technology company, illustrates the appeal. It greatly expanded its presence in New Jersey by moving this year to a 40,000-square-foot space designed for its East Coast headquarters at 1 Tower Center.
The India-based company said it was drawn to the building’s amenities and design. That made possible a variety of workspaces for employees, from quiet nooks to an artificial-intelligence lab. “You can’t just open an office and expect [employees] to be there,” said Meenakshi Benjwal , HCLTech’s head of Americas marketing.
HCLTech also liked the location near the homes of its employees and clients in the pharmaceutical, financial-services and other businesses.
Finally, it didn’t hurt that the building is a short drive from nearby MetLife Stadium. The company has a 75-person suite on the 50 yard line where it entertains clients at concerts and National Football League games.
“All of our clients love to fly from distant locations to experience the suite and stadium,” Benjwal said.
