Developer Retains Bianca Penthouse, in Controversial Port Melbourne Project
Tim Gordon, one half of private Gold Coast-based developer First State Developments, has retained for himself a seventh floor penthouse apartment at the luxury bianca complex, set to start construction on the former TEAC site at 106 Bay Street in Port Melbourne later this year.
Mr Gordon follows in the footsteps of Melbourne-based developer Sam Tarascio, who retained for himself a $15 million apartment on the site of the former Mercy Hospital in East Melbourne, which his company, Salta Properties, is building.
In 2005, Becton founder and non executive chairman Max Beck also snapped up a penthouse apartment in the Espy project he was developing in St Kilda, said to be worth more than $5 million.
The announcement of the bianca development late last year concludes a long and scandalous history for the Port Melbourne site, which receivers sold to First State Developments in 2005, for a price speculated to be $20 million.
Until then, the site was owned by businessman Gavin Muir, founder and 50 per cent shareholder of TEAC Australia – who coincidentally was also planning to build luxury apartments on the site.
Mr Muir was forced to sell his shares in TEAC, as well as his property assets, when it was revealed the company accrued more than $100 million in debt. He was to be investigated for misappropriation of company assets, false invoicing and misleading trading results under his management.
Mr Muir died at a boat show on the Gold Coast in May last year, before charges were to be heard.
