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The Australian prestige residential market has been dominated by offshore buyers, particularly Chinese, during the boom of the past three years, until now.
On Wednesday, a local Australian non-Chinese buyer broke local records paying $26 million off-the-plan for a 272sq m penthouse at level 19 of Sydney's newest 109-unit luxury project Opera Residences to be developed at the former Coca-Cola Amatil headquarters at Macquarie Street in Circular Quay.
It has three bedrooms, four bathrooms, a triple lock up garage and a 270 degree view of the Sydney Opera House and Harbour Bridge.
The price was equivalent to a whopping $95,500 a square metre; the highest residential rate known has been about $50,000 a square metre paid for properties in Point Piper and the CBD.
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The private female buyer, who already lives in the CBD, also bought two sub-penthouses for her children at levels 17 and 18 at $15 million and $16 million each spending $57 million in total. Both are 183sq m with three bedrooms and views.
ECove and Aoyuan's 225sq m penthouse at ONE30 Hyde Park on Elizabeth Street sold for $9.72 million a year ago representing $43,200 a square metre. The topmost 340sq m unit in Chinese developer, Aqualand's The REVY in Darling Island, Pyrmont was priced at about $16 million or $47,000 a square metre.
Even the proposed $100 million penthouse atop Chinese developer Dalian Wanda's future Goldfields House project also in Circular Quay was about $80,000 a square metre, planning approvals permitting.
It knocked Melbourne's most expensive sale, the $25 million 750sq m penthouse at the 100-floor super skyscraper Australia 108 or $33,333 a square metre, out of the ballpark.
"We have been predicting structural change in the Sydney CBD market, this sale will be the re-benchmarking of CBD premium apartments," CBRE residential projects chairman Justin Brown said.
"Our purchaser pool is becoming more and more international and considering our premium products in the same sentence as global financial hubs."
CBRE's Tim Rees who sold the penthouses said the record would be beaten again soon, when the last two penthouse and sub-penthouses at Opera Residences are sold.
"This is the new norm for Australia's super prime property," he said. "Any property in the CBD that is irreplaceable with a northern view can replicate that price."
Chinese developer Macrolink and its local joint venture partner Landream are developing the project after buying the 1207sq m site for $158.5 million earlier this year.
"Opera Residences inhabits Sydney's, if not Australia's, rarest land," Mr Rees said.
"For nearly 25 years, no buyers have been able to purchase a freehold residential residence in this incredible, world famous location and it's highly likely this buying opportunity will never be repeated."