Afterpay’s Anthony Eisen buys $23 million Byron Bay house

Afterpay co-founder Anthony Eisen already owns one of the dozen houses that front Byron Bay’s Wategos Beach, but that has not stopped him from buying a second getaway there for about $23 million.

The three-bedroom house settled to his corporate interests on Wednesday, and while updated title records are yet to confirm the exact purchase price, the sale is already on the record for setting a new benchmark high for Byron Bay.

The Marine Parade home was sold by McGrath’s Will Phillips, who listed it on behalf of retired graziers John and Ilone Small, with his Sydney-based brother Alexander Phillips of PPD.

The house last traded for $1,225,000 in 1997 when Byron Bay was best known as a hangout for hippies and surfers.

Prices locally have been transformed in the post-pandemic market, most notably when a house a few doors away set the previous local record of $22 million in 2020 – when sold by recruitment industry boss Geoff Morgan to Rip Curl co-founder Brian Singer.

Eisen first joined the ranks of Wategos Beach homeowners in 2018 when he bought a property known as The White House for $7.6 million, from Boorowa farmer Charlie Arnott of the Arnotts Biscuit family.

Joining Eisen and his wife Samantha on exclusive Marine Parade are a roll-call of business identities, like F45 co-founder Adam Gilchrist, art collector Steve Nasteski, media boss Antony Catalano and businessman Deke Miskin.

The NSW North Coast has lured an increasingly cashed-up demographic in recent years, including billionaire Justin Hemmes, Swisse vitamins chief Radek Sali, furniture retailer Anthony Scali, philanthropist Tanya Nelson-Carnegie and the Roche Nutrimetics family.