Tesla Town developer rents Melbourne mansion for nearly $170,000 pa
Prominent Melbourne developer Len Warson, whose plans to build a “Tesla Town” eco-village as part of a $2 billion community in Alphington are being thwarted by a legal dispute with the site’s vendor, paper giant, Amcor, is renting out the historic Prahran house he bought for $9.4 million last year.
Grandview, in Grandview Grove – revered as the inner suburb’s best street – is seeking $3250 per week, or $169,000 annually, making it Prahran’s most expensive ever residential rental.
Warson temporarily set a suburban price record when he bought Grandview (that watermark was soon broken by another home in the street which sold for more than $10 million).
On a 1676 square metre block, Grandview is one of the rare residential properties in the suburb to be configured with a tennis court. A six bedroom home on the site, built in 1895, had been part renovated prior to hitting the market last year.
Warson famously bought the Prahran home just five months after paying $7.1 million for another historic mansion, Stainton, at 80 Clowes Road, South Yarra (the builder flipped this home at the end of last year for a speculated $9 million).
Kay & Burton’s Darren McMullin is the leasing agent for Grandview (pictured, top and left).
In 2013, with joint venture partner Alpha Partners, Warson’s company Glenvill paid Amcor $120 million for its redundant Alphington Paper Mill on the banks of the Yarra River, about 6.5 kilometres north east of the CBD.
The consortium plan to replace the 16.5 hectare block with a 2500-dwelling mixed use village Yarra Bend, which will include the country’s first Tesla Town.
However plans to build on the block have
been delayed because, the owners claim, Amcor has not decontaminated the site sufficiently. Amcor meanwhile is counter-suing the environmental engineer for not detecting all the asbestos on site.
It is reported an additional $11 million to $25 million is required to remediate the Alphington site. Amcor has already reportedly spent $17 million to demolish buildings and clean the land.
