Late bookie Harry Barrett's Strathfield home listed

The Strathfield trophy home of the late leviathan bookmaker Harry Barrett has been listed for sale by his widow Pat.

The noted bookmaker and used-car salesman and his wife bought it from Andrew Kelly, the then boss of Strathfield Car Radio.

Set privately behind gates and a walled entry, the home spans 725 square metres.

It has five bedrooms, four bathrooms, a billiard room, home theatre and study.

On the 2365 square metre grounds, there's a swimming pool, a cabana with its own sauna, and an all weather tennis court.

George Ellis and Co Strathfield father and son listing team Sam and Joseph Georges say the estate is reminiscent of an opulent Hollywood mansion.

They have it listed for November 3 auction.

The Barrett's paid $1.9 million for the Redmyre Road home in 1996 when it was sold through Sam Georges.

Barrett, famous for his betting battles with the late Kerry Packer, died in 2011 being absent from his Randwick racetrack stand for only the last few weeks of his life.

He begun on the flat at Randwick in 1972, and by the early 1990s, Barrett had an annual turnover of about $100 million, bolstered by the combative media tycoon Kerry Packer's passion for the punt.

"One day during the Easter carnival in that big year I held $9.6 million," he once let slip to Richard Zacariah, the then Sunday Telegraph columnist.

Barrett also briefly hit the front pages after he bought Sydney's most conspicuous waterfront mansion, Altona, in 1991 through Bill Bridges at W. J. Bridges Real Estate for $6.1 million. 

He thought he got a good buy, though Pat jestingly thought he was off his trolley.

Within a year the Barrett's decided to stay at the Strathfield house they'd bought 17 years prior for $112,000, and Altona was on-sold for $5.25 million to Matt and Fiona Handbury, publishers of Better Homes and Gardens.

Altona had 10 bedrooms and 10 bathrooms, although Harry never occupied Altona but rather, he and his family - while still living at Strathfield - stayed in the boatshed at weekends.

"I'm a very basic guy - it was just too big," Barrett told me on selling Altona.

Rival bookmaker Mark Read once accused Barrett of wearing the same tie for 20 years, with Barrett countering: "I've only got one neck."

The current Strathfield residential record stands at $8.8 million for a Chalmers Road, Strathfield property owned by Sanity boss Ray Itaoui which was sold by George Ellis & Co.

It was on the former holding - then known as the White House - long owned by famous Bullen Circus Family.

West Australian miner Andrew Forrest paid $5.98 million to buy his Sydney base in Quay Grand on Macquarie Street.

It was bought from Strathfield Car Radios chief Andrew Kelly and his wife, Marol, who had Garth Barnett fit out the apartment.

They paid $3.6 million after the block's completion in 1999.

This article was first published in The Sunday Telegraph.