Ken Done’s son buys entire Randwick apartment block

The son of artist Ken Done, Oscar Done, has snapped up a block of flats in Randwick for $11.5 million, $500,000 over reserve.

Done was the winning bidder when the 24 two-bedroom flats with “elements of Art Deco style” in the two government-owned blocks at 9 and 11-13 Mulwarree Ave went under the hammer at Thursday’s online auction, sources close to the sale say.

However, the CBRE agents, Paul Grasso, Nicholas Heaton and Gemma Isgro, were tight-lipped when contacted about the final price and the identity of the purchaser — confirming only the result was half a million dollars above the reserve price.

The house next door sold for $2.3 million, which was $300,000 over the reserve, to a builder.

But the apartments were the main game. With auctioneer Jesse Davidson of Auctionworks presiding, there were 16 registered parties, with five active.

Oscar Done is emerging as a major player in apartment development with his purchase of a Randwick block of flats for $11.5 million at an online auction on Thursday. Picture: Renee Nowytarger

Grasso says they’d been guiding $10 million for the flats, which had been sitting vacant for two years and were completely uninhabitable.

“We had such a diverse background of buyers — investors, builders, developers and everyone else looking,” he says.

The apartments had hit the market before the coronavirus crisis struck, attracting 400 inquiries from 400 potential buyers in Hong Kong alone.

It was the location of the apartments on the 1305sqm block that won them over — they’re just footsteps from the light rail station, Royal Randwick Shopping Centre, UNSW and Centennial Park.

The two-bedroom apartments had “elements of Art Deco style”.

And rather than having to be a complete knockdown scenario, buyers loved that they could simply refurb the apartments and sell them off one at a time.

Ther’s a lot less risk involved,” Grasso says.

Oscar Done is no stranger to apartment projects, having developed The Surry, a block of apartments in Surry Hills, in 2017 with his sister, Camilla.

The boutique development, designed by Angelo Candalepas and Associates architects, consists of 24 apartments, plus ground floor commercial spaces, at the corner of Elizabeth and Devonshire streets.

The apartments are a blank canvas, allowing the buyer to refurbish and sell off one at a time.

The CBRE agents had sold a block of 27 two-bedroom units at 10 Henrietta St, Waverley, last year, for $20 million, which were another refurbishment scenario.

The buyer then had been a Russian family, who its understood had also been the underbidders on the Randwick flats that went under the hammer yesterday.

This article from the Wentworth Courier originally appeared as “Artist Ken Done’s son Oscar Done buys block of flats in Randwick for $11.5m, $500k over reserve”.