Heritage Home With Designer Features In Park-like Gardens Goes Up For Sale

An enormous family home – believed to be one of the biggest in its Auckland suburb - whose interior décor design styles span two different centuries has been placed on the market for sale.

The 469 square metre home at 46 Lloyd Avenue sits on a massive 2,233 square metres of mature landscaped land and gardens – adjoining Mt Albert Croquet Club’s pristine mown lawns, and with Ferndale Park on the other side of the grounds.

Current owners Anne and John Land have retained the immaculately maintained north-facing home for the past 44 years – adding the second storey to the original villa cross bungalow and modernising all of the lower level. It has only had one other owner prior to that – built by the Garlick family who also erected Mount Albert’s Ferndale House which hosts community events.

The substantial stately Lloyd Avenue manor contains five bedrooms, five lounges and living areas, and four bathrooms. The majestic residence encompasses a consented 110 square metre one-bedroom apartment – with its own separate entrance and open-plan modern and large kitchen and living area overlooking the back lawn.

From the street, the home’s façade looks straight out of the early 1900s in an arts and crafts style seen in many surrounding Mount Albert properties. Inside, the formal dining room and lounge areas are also from the same period – with native New Zealand timber window and door framing reflecting a regal elegance. Other design influences from the period include bay windows, lead lighting in the upper frames of the windows, and two original fireplaces – now converted to gas heating.

The upstairs bedroom hints at the merging of the ‘old and new’ design styles – with the structural features retained then complimented by modern colourings and fittings – such as the en-suite bathroom with its clean stone tiling.

However, the home’s kitchen and downstairs areas are straight from the pages of a 2010 interior design magazine – showcasing sleek clean white lines and open-plan living zones.

The kitchen and adjoining lounge both feature bi-fold windows and doors leading out onto the expansive deck with its sweeping staircase leading down to the flat back lawn suitable for playing tennis, lawn bowls, or even to accommodate a swimming pool cabana area.

The lawn has even hosted the marriage of one of Anne and John’s children.

The home is now being marketed for sale by Bayleys Ponsonby, with offers closing on November 3. Salesperson Jock Kooger believes it is one of the biggest houses and landholdings in Mt Albert – his specialist sales ‘patch’.

Jock Kooger said it was also incredibly rare for a single section of this size to come onto the market for sale – with many landholdings in Mt Albert subdivided down into much smaller portions. Part of the original Garlick family homestead at 46 Lloyd Avenue was part of that trend – when part of the founding dwelling was sliced off and shifted just a few metres away to become what is now 48 Lloyd Avenue.

“The options for what could be done in the back lawn at 46 Lloyd Avenue are endless…. keeping them as they are, building a grass tennis court, laying in a golf putting green, or dropping in a luxurious landscaped swimming pool complex in a Balinese, Mediterranean or Florida style,” said Jock Kooger.

“Mount Albert is one of Auckland’s oldest suburbs, and was originally predominantly farm land. Suburban housing intensified in the area during the 1920s and ‘30s, with some of those earlier cottages replaced in the 1940s when New Zealand armed servicemen returning from World War II established family dwellings. Interspersed were a smattering of more substantial homes built by what you could say were members of the “upper middle class”.

“The home at 46 Lloyd Avenue certainly falls into the later classification.”

Mr Kooger said that with an Auckland Council valuation rating of $4.85 million, the heritage home would be expected to sell for well above any sales achieved in Mount Albert this year. 
Substantial value would come from the large 2,233 square metre landholding, he added.

“It’s the classic cliché…… ‘they just don’t build them like this anymore’,” Mr Kooger said.

“With design styles and features spanning the 20th and 21st centuries, this home and its substantial landholding are quite unique for Mount Albert – and are ready to welcome a new family in to enjoy everything it has to offer.”

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