Polo baron Peter Yunghanns selling $50m Yaloak Estate
Fresh from an unsuccessful and long-running Supreme Court defamation battle, polo benefactor and Melbourne businessman Peter Yunghanns has put his 5071-hectare Yaloak Estate near Ballan up for sale with price tag in excess of $50 million.
The estate at 4662 Geelong-Ballan Road, which Mr Yunghanns has owned for more than 50 years, is home to the renowned Yaloak Polo Club as well as a grand 1890s homestead, numerous dwellings plus thousands of hectares of cropping and grazing land less than 60 kilometres from Melbourne.
Mr Yunghanns, a veteran corporate raider, lawyer and former Coonawarra vineyard owner, had until last month been locked in a three-year defamation battle with Nicholas Colquhoun-Denvers, the former president of the Federation of International Polo, the sport’s governing body.
Both men had sued each other over a series of FIP email exchanges that each claimed defamed the other. But in July Justice Terry Forrest in the Supreme Court of Victoria decided that there would be no winner and dismissed both claims.
A month later, and Mr Yunghanns has decided to sell Yaloak, where he stables more than 1000 horses and which has played host to Melbourne high society polo games for decades.
Colliers International’s Duncan McCulloch and James Beer, in conjunction with David Williams and Tim Faulkner of Kidder Williams have been appointed to market Yaloak internationally.
The agents said they expect the large-scale landholding to attract keen interest from domestic and international land bankers, high net worth individuals and developers.
“This represents the biggest land banking opportunity to come to the market in recent years,” Mr McCulloch said.
“However, it is also a highly productive agricultural enterprise and, as such, we anticipate an influx of interest from a wide range of buyer groups.”
The property comprises about 2003 hectares of arable land suitable for cropping, with the balance predominantly utilised for grazing.
“Most of the grazing land has been further improved with perennial pastures as well as some areas with bi-annual pastures, together with a comprehensive fertiliser regime,” Mr Beer said.
Mr McCulloch said the property’s prime position within easy travelling distance of not only the Melbourne CBD, but also Ballarat (35km) and Geelong (44km) would further increase its appeal to buyers.
“Melbourne has become one of the fastest-growing cities in the developed world, racing away from the rest of Australia and doubling the rate of growth of most cities in advanced economies,” he said.
“The continued expansion of the City of Melbourne provides a unique opportunity for an astute long-term investor to capitalise on this outstanding growth opportunity, given both the ideal location of Yaloak Estate and the sheer scale of the landholding.”
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