Gold Coast’s Trophy Market Fires Up for Summer. But It’s Not The Beach.
Prestige demand is shifting inland, where riverfront estates and acreage compounds are setting new records.
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The Gold Coast prestige property market has ignited ahead of summer, but this time the heat isn’t coming from the beachfront. Instead, high-end buyers — both local and interstate — are turning their attention inland, where sprawling acreages and riverfront estates are redefining luxury living.
The latest headline-grabbing sale is Rivers Bend in Carrara (pictured), which has changed hands for a record $26 million — the highest price achieved along Main River this year and the second-largest riverfront sale in Gold Coast history.
Set on 6,300 sqm, the estate offers a masterclass in design and amenities. The primary residence features five bedrooms, including a master suite with a Nero Marquina marble ensuite and a 1.2-tonne freestanding bath. A gym, theatre room, 700-bottle temperature-controlled wine cellar, and garaging for 12 vehicles add to the home’s appeal.
Outdoors, the riverside entertaining terrace features a commercial-grade bar and kitchen. In contrast, the 18m saltwater pool — complete with spa, swim-up bar, firepit and TV — overlooks a championship-sized tennis court and rooftop pavilion. A self-contained two-bedroom guesthouse, complete with its own pool and spa, rounds out the estate.
The sale of Rivers Bend follows that of Redwood, the Currumbin Valley acreage that was quietly sold for $28 million earlier this year. The 2.88-hectare estate, last purchased for $2.55 million in 2017, was transformed by vendor Bridget Deer, wife of Ignite Travel founder Randall Deer.
The only other sale this year to break through the $20 million threshold was a Hamptons-style riverfront home in Southport, selling for $22 million.
Designed by Bayden Goddard, the four-level, 1,805sqm residence on Macmillan Court showcases century-old red ironbark flooring, Carrara marble, and chandeliers sourced from New York and Paris.
Among its highlights are five ensuite bedrooms, a chef’s kitchen with a cold room and three ovens, a 3,000-bottle wine cellar, an Aspen-inspired games den, and a six-bar basement.
The top floor is dedicated to leisure, featuring a gym, steam room, and a rooftop bar that accommodates up to 50 guests, complemented by open-plan living spaces that flow seamlessly into a north-facing saltwater pool and spa.
The newest addition to the trophy market is The Estate in Tallai, listed by former AFL player turned tech entrepreneur Brad Moran and marketed by Kollosche. Carved into the mountainside of its 8,888 sqm site, the ultra-luxury residence makes a statement from arrival, with a circular driveway of 75,000 hand-laid cobblestones and a five-element fountain finished in 24-carat gold mosaics.
The 2,240sqm home spans three levels and features 10 bedrooms, 11 bathrooms, a whisky bar, poker room, 16-seat cinema, and a wellness centre complete with gym, yoga studio, sauna, steam room, and hydrotherapy pools.
Outside, a “private fun park” includes a 160m go-kart track, putting green, basketball court, and 20m gold-tiled infinity pool.
Three self-contained “Sky Residences” cater for guests. At the same time, a glass-fronted garage gallery with space for nine cars — plus a race simulator and executive office — cements The Estate as one of the Gold Coast’s most spectacular offerings.
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Kit Braden, an executive at French beauty empire L’Occitane, has spent every winter for the past 13 years at the stone vacation home.
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A historic Barbados estate with a 300-year-old villa and 11 acres overlooking the Caribbean Sea is now for sale with a guide price of $22.5 million.
The seller is Kit Braden, chairman of the U.K. branch of French beauty empire L’Occitane Group, whose family has spent every winter for the last 13 years at the island property, known as Fustic Estate.
“It’s very much a family house,” Braden said. “We love having a lot of people there. It’s a collection point to keep everyone together.”
The main villa dates to 1712, though it’s been reimagined and expanded substantially over the years.
It spans 13,000 square feet and features seven en suite bedrooms across three wings, as well as expansive verandas, stone courtyards and rows of louvered doors in gay Caribbean pastels.
In the 1970s, when the home was owned by Charles Graves—brother of British poet Robert Graves—it was reimagined by stage designer Oliver Messel, one of the foremost theater designers of the last century. Messel expanded the home, added a lagoon pool with a natural waterfall and other theatrical features, according to Braden.
“The whole place is a little bit magical,” he said.
The home sits about 350 feet above the water, and surrounded by lush gardens that slope towards the water.
“We look down through our garden—which is about 12 acres of tropical gardens and palm trees and wonderful old mahogany trees—onto the Caribbean,” Braden said.
He and his wife first saw the property on New Year’s Eve 2013, during a quick trip from where they were staying in Grenada.
The couple spent an hour walking the perimeter, some of it still untouched jungle, in the pouring rain.
“By the time we got back, I had fallen in love with it,” Braden said.
His wife, however, wasn’t so sure. But in Braden’s telling, a second visit in sunnier weather with two of their children brought her around.
“She had to be talked into that it was a jolly good idea; now she absolutely loves it,” he said.
When they bought the property, the edge that runs along the waterfront was a jungle, so they cleared the ridge and transformed it into gardens.
They also bought an additional sea-level parcel with two beach cottages, giving the property direct access to the water and the town below via a five-minute walk.
The property also has a 15-person staff, a reflecting pond, an outdoor pavilion suitable for yoga and a commercial grade kitchen that can serve more than 100 guests, according to a brochure from Knight Frank, which posted the listing in March. They did not provide further comment.
For Braden, the property is special because of its natural beauty, its proximity to the town of Saint Lucy and its history—which dates way way back to when the island of Barbados was first formed via tectonic activity.
“It was basically tectonic plates that collided about a million years ago so the seabed is the top of the hill,” Braden said. “We’re on coral rock.”
As a result, Fustic Estate includes an extensive network of caves that were likely used by the Arawaks, a Venezuelan fishing tribe that followed the fish to these islands about a thousand years ago.
“If the fish were good they’d camp here,” Braden said. “There’s evidence that they stayed there in those caves, they lived there in good winters.”
Now it’s someone else’s turn to live on the land shared by Arawaks, the plantation owners of 1712, Charles Graves and the Braden brood.
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