Taking the biscuit in this week’s roundup of the weird and not-so-wonderful stories in the property pages is a yarn about an uninhabitable derelict cottage that has sold for over $1m – ten times what it cost when it last sold 35 years ago.

We assume the real value is the land on which it will soon no longer stand. You’ll find a link to the full story in this week’s feed from Leftfield Communications.

Free Reads

Domain

A hidden cabin, 67 hectares and a $115,000 price tag: what’s the catch?
A secluded one-bedroom weekender on about 67 hectares of pristine West Gippsland wilderness has been reduced to $115,000.

They rejected an offer on their home because the buyer wanted to knock down the house
After more than a century in the same family, the owners of a cherished Brisbane home are prepared to forgo a significant windfall in the hope of finding a buyer who will preserve rather than demolish it.

Ross Noble drops price on sprawling Mornington Peninsula home
British comedian Ross Noble and his wife Fran have cut the price of their Mount Eliza home, dropping the six-bedroom Mornington Peninsula property’s guide to $2.9 million to $3.2 million ahead of a move back to the UK.

Singer Ren Barlow lists grand Brighton mansion for up to $17.6 million
Singer and philanthropist Ren Barlow is selling her grand Brighton mansion Narellan for up to $17.6 million just two years after buying it for $13.28 million, with the neighbouring former front-garden block also listed, offering a rare chance to reunite the two.

Fashion designer Wayne Cooper lists luxury Byron hinterland retreat
British-born fashion designer Wayne Cooper has listed his luxury Byron hinterland retreat, moving on from the home of the London East End-raised designer who built iconic Australian clothing brands.

Unliveable Sydney home sells for shocking seven-figure sum
A derelict Tempe home with rotting floors and missing walls has sold for a seven-figure sum, the three-bedroom property fetching $1.001 million, $51,000 above its guide, more than a week before its scheduled auction despite being unliveable.

The Sydney suburbs proving harbour views don’t always command the biggest prices
It is not always water views that command Sydney’s biggest prices, with new analysis finding some suburbs away from the harbour or beach carry higher median house prices than view-rich neighbours the same distance from the CBD.

Robin left home in his pyjamas and returned with a new house
When Robin Judkins set out for a morning walk in his pyjamas in 1987, he came home having bought the neighbouring house, the New Zealander recovering from a broken neck when boredom sent him wandering his Christchurch street.

The Sydney mansion 200 people chased without even knowing its address
A week before it listed online, scores of people scrambled to learn the address of a private estate in Sydney’s east, the Paddington Street home of the late Carole and Walter Lamerton listed with hopes above $20 million in a softer market.

Roxy Jacenko slashes price for luxury Sydney office by millions
Roxy Jacenko has slashed millions from the guide on her luxury Paddington office as she severs ties with Australia, with the former Sweaty Betty PR headquarters having failed to sell at a $10 million-plus auction in May.

Commercial Real Estate

Why developers are turning laneways into Australia’s hottest urban precincts
Developers are turning service laneways into some of Australia’s hottest urban precincts, with Circular Quay’s Loftus Lane, once the preserve of delivery vans, reimagined as a place for coffee, dining and homes.

Anthropic anchors proposed $32b Queensland data centre
Anthropic, the company behind Claude, has signed to anchor a proposed $32 billion data centre in Queensland’s Western Downs, with Dexus confirming its Australian Data Centres business is working with Zerra DC and Macquarie Capital on the site.

ABC Online

Broken Hill council tells homeless charity there is ‘no land’ for rough sleepers camp
Broken Hill council has told a food charity there is no land available for a homeless camp, with the mayor citing planning and consultation hurdles, in a case a law academic says highlights the lack of a legal framework around homelessness in NSW.

Realestate.com.au

Three Aussie neighbourhoods named among the coolest in the world
Three Australian neighbourhoods have made Time Out’s 2026 coolest-in-the-world list, with Brisbane’s New Farm 29th, North Hobart 32nd and South Melbourne 39th, behind Seoul’s Jongno 3-ga in top spot.

Owner forced to rip out $800 lawn by council
A Western Australian homeowner who spent $800 turning a boring grass nature strip into something greener has been ordered by the council to rip it out, and restore the strip to its previous state.

Sydney homeowner cops $1700 a day loss as price falls continue
A homeowner in Sydney’s Epping has taken a loss estimated at more than $1,700 a day, with the five-bedroom house selling for $3,638,000, well below the $4.05 million it fetched only a year earlier as prices keep falling.

Landlord devastated after rental home torched days after reno
A landlord has been left devastated after his Moree rental was allegedly torched days after he finished a $95,000 renovation to repair an earlier fire, with the second blaze set to cost more than he paid for the house and derailing his finances.

Luxury Gold Coast estate used by George Clooney sells off-market for $24m
A Gold Coast Hinterland estate that served as George Clooney’s base while filming in Australia has sold off-market for about $24 million, the 22-hectare Rivermead offering an equestrian facility, polo field and resort-sized pool.

Does living near a Costco boost your home value?
Living near a Costco can lift nearby home values, with Vancouver School of Economics research finding store openings boost property prices, especially in already densely populated areas.

Renters set to slash power bills as energy ministers back plug-in solar rollout
Renters could soon cut power bills after energy ministers backed a plug-in solar rollout, with Solar Citizens welcoming the move to explore safe deployment of plug-in solar and batteries for those locked out of rooftop systems.

Rabbitohs NRL star Jye Gray’s big first home buy
South Sydney star Jye Gray has bought his first home in Rabbitohs heartland at Maroubra, with the 22-year-old fullback securing a two-bedroom apartment off-market near the club’s Heffron Park base.

‘Breaks his heart’: Sharyn Ghidella reveals sadness as family farm is listed for sale
Queensland newsreader Sharyn Ghidella has shared her heartbreak at the listing of her family farm at Babinda in the state’s Far North, in an emotional social media post about the place she grew up.

Waste tycoon Ian Malouf puts luxury 73m superyacht on market for $160m
Australia’s richest garbo, Dial-a-Dump founder Ian Malouf, has listed his 73-metre superyacht Coral Ocean for $160 million, having bought it on a whim in 2019 for about US$50 million and spent a further 35 million euros restoring it.

Aussie searches for New Zealand properties have almost doubled after federal budget changes
Australian searches for New Zealand property have almost doubled since the federal budget changes.

Street artist Lenny ‘Nekta’ Gould lists $4.6m Hampton home
Street artist and former rapper Lenny Gould, known as Nekta, has listed a $4.6 million Hampton home he built inspired by his young son, with the muralist’s work seen on Melbourne’s Chapel and Carlisle streets.

Singer Ren Barlow lists $16m Brighton mansion for sale
Brighton’s top end is back up and running, with singer-songwriter Ren Barlow listing her $16 million mansion after the owners of Bali Body notched a $10 million-plus sale and a $96 million combined offering landed nearby.

‘Disgraceful’: Families told to surrender backyards
Mornington homeowners say they have been blindsided after learning chunks of their long-fenced backyards are not theirs, with some ordered to remove fences, pay for surveyors and hand back land they have treated as their own for decades.

Stephen Akehurst-designed Brighton hits the market
A Brighton house by designer Stephen Akehurst is drawing buyers from as far as China and the Middle East, with the five-bedroom Cole Street home, complete with pool and built-in trampoline, guided at $8 million to $8.8 million.

Council warns residents reckless bin acts are threatening lives
An Adelaide council has urged residents to think hard about what goes in the bin, with the City of Tea Tree Gully reporting two waste-truck fires in a fortnight caused by batteries and e-waste in kerbside bins.

Pay-walled

The Australian Financial Review

‘Refreshing’: Vendor doesn’t sweat the loss in $2.4m sale
A two-bedroom house on 436 square metres at 18 Ralston Street, Lane Cove has sold at auction for $2,382,000, with the vendor taking a philosophical view of a result below earlier hopes.

LJ Hooker heir wants to tap suburban landbank his grandfather created
Real estate heir Janusz Hooker wants to use the network his grandfather built to sell landlords a granny flat he has designed, tapping wealthy families to fund the roughly $250,000, two-bedroom OHOME units, which he promises within 150 days of order.

The chance meeting that linked Mary Fairfax to a pub empire
As a girl, Genia Mannevich played around the Oxford Street pub her great uncle managed after emigrating from Russia in 1920, in the story of a chance 1928 meeting outside the Burdekin Hotel that later linked her to Mary Fairfax and a pub empire.

Pacific Fair turns storage space into Kylie Jenner-endorsed pop-up
Kylie Jenner’s hydration drink is going offline, with the beauty mogul turning an unused storage corridor at Pacific Fair Shopping Centre into a pop-up in a test of physical retail for a brand built on social media.

The Sydney Morning Herald

‘Totally exposed’: Harbour tensions flare over Walsh Bay event space
A planning dispute has flared over a $4.9 million plan to turn part of a heritage-listed Walsh Bay pier into a 750-patron event venue, pitting residents against hospitality operators and reigniting debate over Sydney’s nighttime economy.

This is the data centre capital of the world. They’re starting to regret it
Business is booming in Virginia’s data centre alley, generating over a billion dollars in tax revenue, but locals say enough is enough, in a dispatch from the world’s data centre capital as residents begin to regret it.

Moguls behind Kylie Jenner-endorsed sunglasses brand list Byron Shire mansion
Eyewear moguls Linda and Allen Hammond have listed their Coopers Shoot home in the Byron Shire at $13.5 million to $14.5 million, with Linda the founder of Otra Eyewear and co-founder of Quay Australia, sold to US private equity in 2016.

Celebrity accountant Anthony Bell to offload Rose Bay pad after $26m buy
Celebrity accountant Anthony Bell has listed his Rose Bay apartment, the SMH reports, after deciding he enjoyed renting at Barangaroo’s Crown Residences so much that he bought there rather than move into the unit he had intended as his home.

The Age

‘Miserable’ neighbours blamed for the banning of popular inner-city pastime
Drinking on Carlton’s popular median strips will no longer be allowed, with one small business blaming a handful of miserable residents after the City of Yarra called police over sustained complaints about picnics along the leafy inner-north streets.

The Brisbane Times

Young family secures $1.5m nature-filled sanctuary home
A pair of snoozing koalas upstaged the auctioneer at Upper Mount Gravatt on Saturday, as a young family secured the nature-filled five-bedroom home at 43 Granby Street for $1.5 million with four bidders competing.

Mini-Times Square? New digital billboard planned in centre of Queen Street Mall
Plans are progressing for another large digital billboard in Brisbane’s Queen Street Mall, with an application lodged for a new roof to support it, in a Times Square-ification that one expert says raises questions about the future of public space.

The Daily Telegraph

Housing crisis threatens Sydney’s world-leading liveability as home prices surge to 14 times income
Sydney is among the world’s least affordable cities to buy a home, with prices now 14 times income, with the Benchmarking Sydney 2026 report finding housing affordability the biggest constraint on an otherwise well-rounded, liveable global city.

Albanese government could have saved $100m by keeping Sydney’s Victoria Barracks
The Albanese government could have saved about $100 million by keeping Sydney’s Victoria Barracks as its defence hub, with documents showing the Defence Plaza lease and fit-out cost $275.4 million, casting doubt on claims the Paddington base was too expensive to maintain.

The Herald Sun

Victorians are being hit with council rate hikes. But challenging them could backfire
Victorian homeowners are being hit with sharp council rate rises even as home prices fall, though experts warn that challenging an assessment could leave owners worse off.

The Gold Coast Bulletin

Gold Coast backyard pod listed for $430 a week pulled after online backlash
A viral $430-a-week backyard pod has been pulled after online backlash, exposing a rental crisis where Gold Coast rents have doubled since 2021.

The Adelaide Advertiser

South Australian Housing Trust to assess asbestos risk to tenant’s soft furnishings after five-month testing delay
The South Australian Housing Trust left a public housing tenant exposed to asbestos risks for five months and a termite infestation for seven, and will now assess the risk to the tenant’s soft furnishings after a testing delay.

Adelaide real estate agent hits back at trolls over property video
An Adelaide real estate agent has hit back at internet trolls, after one of her property walk-through videos attracted unsavoury comments.

The Newcastle Herald

22,000 households are eligible for affordable housing, but it barely exists
Affordable rental housing has all but vanished from Port Stephens, with council figures showing it makes up less than 0.001 per cent of homes and a 0.8 per cent vacancy rate, as 22,000 households are eligible but providers are overwhelmed.

Cost of housing can’t be green spaces: inside the fight to save Link Road Forest
Hunter Workers has joined the fight to save more than 500 hectares of Link Road Forest from residential redevelopment, the Newcastle Herald reports, arguing residents should not have to choose between homes and green space, with a petition of more than 10,000 signatures bound for parliament.