Record price expected for Sorrento’s Sisters estate
After ten years and a legal brawl, Sorrento’s historic The Sisters will be sold.
The three acre property could trade for $20 million – smashing the state record.
The beachfront holding was owned by Peter Thomas Rand; it is part of a $50m estate also including the Mahonga mansion in South Yarra’s Domain Road and 79 investment properties.
On Point Nepean Road, The Sisters occupies one of the area’s largest land holdings.
Mr Rand died in 1997.
He had four years earlier made headlines for spending $700,000 on the home next door to his Melbourne so he could cut down a tree blocking his city view.
Prior to The Sisters being listed, a dispute needed to be resolved between a friend of the businessman, Michael Aquilina, who lives at Mahonga, and Toorak couple Paula and Pamela Harpur, which were occupying the Sorrento residence.
The case focused on the authenticity of a will which would have come into effect six days before Mr Rand’s death, allowing the latter couple to live at Sorrento until they died, then for the home to given to the National Gallery of Victoria and Anti-Cancer Council.
In the end, the Appeals Court ordered The Sisters be vacated.
The peninsula’s record house price was set in 2006 when Charles Jacobsen spent $14.5m for part of a Mt Eliza estate once held by Sir Reginald Ansett.
Victoria’s watermark was achieved last year – when Rod Menzies spent $18m on Malvern’s Stonington.
