EXCLUSIVE
Footy great Anthony Minichiello is fed up with constant speculation about why the Sydney harbourside mansion he and wife Terry Biviano have been building for almost a decade remains unfinished.
The Roosters legend told Daily Mail Australia he and Biviano expected to finally move into their dream home later this year – and the fact the project had taken so long to complete was nobody else’s business.
Minichiello, 44, vehemently denied that the delay has anything to do with the recent demise of a sports software company he fronted, which collapsed under a $1.3million tax debt.
‘If I want to take eight years to build a house, then I will,’ he said.
That has not satisfied some of the pair’s frustrated neighbours, one of whom said: ‘I wonder how welcome they’ll be’.
Minichiello starred at fullback for the Roosters, NSW and Australia, and since retiring from the NRL has run health and fitness programs for children under the MinFit banner.
Biviano gained fame as a shoe designer before marrying Minichiello in 2012 and the 49-year-old fashionista recently signed on for a second season of the Real Housewives of Sydney.
Together, ‘Mini’ and ‘The Biv’ have been red carpet fixtures, once topping a tabloid list of the city’s power couples in which they were likened to David and Victoria Beckham.
Footy great Anthony Minichiello is fed up with constant speculation about why the Sydney harbourside mansion he and wife Terry Biviano have been building for almost a decade remains unfinished. The couple is pictured
Mininchiello told Daily Mail Australia he and Biviano expected to finally move into their Vaucluse dream home later this year and the fact the project had taken so long to complete was nobody else’s business. The house is pictured late last month
In December 2014, the couple spent $3.1million on a four-bedroom brick house at Vaucluse with the intention of turning the rundown pile into their ‘Mini mansion’.
They later decided to knock down the existing structure and start from scratch but objections from neighbours, cost blow-outs and the Covid-19 pandemic have repeatedly delayed construction.
When Minichiello and Biviano took the keys to the house, their daughter Azura had just celebrated her first birthday – she turns 11 at the end of the year.
Minichiello could not understand why there had been so much attention on the building’s progress, but assured Daily Mail Australia it was nearing completion.
‘It’s all systems go again, which is good,’ he said.
Minichiello said the ‘five bloody years’ he had spent dealing with Woollahra Council had added to the length of construction but nothing was holding it back now.
‘We’ve got joinery, we’ve got retaining walls getting rendered, a plasterer, tiler – they’re all working at the moment,’ he said.
‘We’re on track to move in later this year.’
Minichiello and Biviano spent spent $3.1million on this four-bedroom brick house in Hopetoun Avenue, Vaucluse in December 2014, with the intention of turning the rundown pile into their ‘Mini mansion’
Minichiello also addressed reports he and Biviano had been staying with her parents in the city’s inner-west in the meantime, saying they had been renting in the eastern suburbs.
He supported Biviano’s previous assurances the project had not stalled due to lack of funds.
When Daily Mail Australia visited the Vaucluse site on Wednesday afternoon there were three tradies’ utes parked on the road and a portable toilet stood behind a temporary fence.
At least four workers were toiling away inside the Hopetoun Avenue house and the noise of power tools could be heard from the street.
Several neighbours said they were still annoyed by the ongoing construction and would be relieved if the end was in sight.
‘It’s been enormously frustrating,’ one said. ‘There’s been lots of difficulties and issues.
‘Its dragged on for an enormous amount of time. We’ll be enormously grateful when it’s completed.’
The couple decided to knock down the home they bought and build from scratch but objections from neighbours, cost blow-outs and the Covid-19 pandemic have repeatedly delayed construction. The house is pictured in late May
Minichiello told Daily Mail Australia that tradesmen were back on the site. ‘We’re on track to move in later this year,’ he said. Three workers are pictured at the house
One of the issues mentioned by several nearby property owners was that a pool dug on the block became home to a chorus of frogs and a breeding ground for swarms of mosquitoes.
Other complaints were made about a proposed rooftop terrace which had been rejected by council and replaced by an enormous skylight.
‘It’s looking at the mess, for a start,’ another neighbour said. ‘People would come in for a couple of days then they’d go. It just hasn’t been a consistent build.
‘It would be nice if it was done at some point.’
A third neighbour had heard about multiple real estate agents visiting the property and recommending Minichiello and Biviano sell up.
‘They’ve told us for the last four years that they’re going to be in by Christmas,’ that neighbour said.
‘All we can hope for is that they do shift in at some point in time and that the build is finished.
‘They may shift in. Whether it happens this year or not we don’t know but it’s an eyesore at the moment.’
Minichiello addressed reports he and Biviano had been staying with her parents in the city’s inner-west in the meantime, saying they had been renting in the eastern suburbs
Daily Mail Australia reported last week that a sports software company fronted by Minichiello had collapsed under a $1.3million tax debt and he could potentially have to pick up the bill.
Minichiello had signed on as an ambassador for Sports Foyer through a Roosters fan called John Issa but said it was only later he learned he had been made a director of the company.
He had also not known until recently that Issa had convictions for defrauding almost $1million from three financial institutions including NAB and St George Bank.
The Federal Court declared Sports Foyer insolvent and ordered it be wound up last month.
Minichiello said he was getting legal advice about whether he could personally be liable for at least part of Sports Foyer’s tax debt but insisted there was no link between the unfinished home and the company collapsing.
‘That’s got nothing to do with this stuff,’ he said.
Minichiello and Biviano sold their Bondi Beach penthouse for almost $2million five months before buying in Vaucluse, after searching for the right place for about a year.
Unexpected costs, labour shortages and supply chain problems caused by the pandemic then contributed to multiple delays in construction of the three-storey house (pictured in 2022)
The existing 1980-built dwelling, which sat on a 770 sq m block with 20m of street frontage, was described at the time as being in a ‘very nice part of Vaucluse’ and ‘renovator’s delight’.
‘Held by one family for 35 years, it’s surrounded by prestige family homes at the peaceful end of one of Sydney’s premier streets,’ advertising material stated.
Minichiello and Biviano’s personal buyer Oliver Berger of Hastings Property told Daily Mail Australia the couple had snapped up the house before it hit the market.
‘All they wanted was to be on the harbourside of Vaucluse, nothing else, and that’s the most expensive side,’ he said.
Back then, Minichiello and Biviano hoped to move into their new home by late 2015.
Almost two years after the purchase the couple lodged a development application for a $560,000 renovation which included a new second-floor level, pergola and garage extension.
Neighbours had complained about a proposed rooftop terrace which they said would block views and overlook their houses. The planned terrace plan was replaced by an enormous skylight
Their plans were lodged with Woollahra Council in August 2016 while they were living in their former Bondi Beach penthouse, which they had leased back.
In April 2017, Biviano revealed instead of renovating the house they were knocking down the original home and building from the ground up.
‘It is in its very early stages,’ Biviano told the Telegraph. ‘The slab hasn’t even been laid yet.’
Unexpected costs, labour shortages and supply chain problems caused by the pandemic then contributed to multiple delays in construction of the three-storey house.
In September 2022, Minichiello told the Telegraph he and Biviano had fought neighbours’ objections to their plans, including over the loss of harbour views.
When Minichiello and Biviano took the keys to the house their daughter Azura had just celebrated her first birthday – she turns 11 at the end of the year. The top floor is pictured
He also conceded he and Biviano had been ‘too eager’ in the early days of the project.
‘Building a house has been a huge learning curve for us, as first-time builders,’ Minichiello said.
‘Especially during Covid. The pandemic hit and everything shut down. Now we’re back into it. Work finally recommenced this year.’
By then, carpenters, painters, stonemasons were labouring on the of the cube design building and the middle floor was complete.
At the time, Biviano dismissed suggestions the couple had been financially stretched by the setbacks, saying ‘If we couldn’t afford [the house] we’d have sold it’.
Minichiello and Biviano had hoped to be moving into the property, which they estimated to be worth upwards of $7million even if unfinished, by Easter 2023.
In November last year Biviano told Daily Mail Australia she and Minichiello had experienced ‘a little bit of a problem’ with a neighbour.
‘It’s just normal stuff when building a house,’ she said. ‘I think everyone has those issues and Covid of course didn’t help.
‘It’s all in progress and at the end of the day, it’s just a house.’
