Cronulla beachfront for September auction

The childcare magnate Martyn Downs and wife Helena have listed their Cronulla beachfront home for September 7 auction.

Estate agent David Highlands, of Highland Property Agents, expects between $7 million and $7.5 million for the home, one of the best in the Sutherland Shire.

"There has not been anything comparable publicly available," David Highland suggested.

There have been whispers of an off market $8.25 million sale nearby on the peninsula on Darook Park Road where the prior highest recorded sale was $6.15 million in 2012.

The Taloombi Street home is eight bedrooms and six bathrooms over three levels which was substantially renovated twice over the past decade. No hint of the 1960s red brick home. 

The tightly held street prices hit $3.9 million in 2003 and peaked at $6.9 million in 2007.

Since he paid $4.35 million in 2005, Martyn Downs has been nicknamed "the mayor of Gunnamatta Bay."

The family have been out looking around for a penthouse-style abode in the shire, with plans of spending more time at their 70 acre black Angus cattle farm with newly built French Provincial-style homestead at Bundanoon, in the Southern Highlands, along with their inner city bolt hole.

Downs recently bought the Royal Hotel at Bowral, attracted to the main street acquisition given the inclusion of seven shops and restaurant in the popular tourism destination. 

Downs has been an operator and developer of child care centres since 1992, seizing the opportunity of the past few years to sell some of his leasehold businesses into the listed G8 group while keeping the freehold.

This article was first published in the Sunday Telegraph.