By Andrew Starke
Investors including billionaire Gerry Harvey, advertising entrepreneur John Singleton, property investor Robert Whyte and the Laundy publican family have teamed up to buy the Steyne Hotel in Manly.
The beachfront property is believed to have sold for about $27 million, well down on the $47 million that Bruce McHugh and his family paid in 2006.
The Steyne Hotel had not gone into receivership but it is believed that its owners were facing pressure from their banks to sell.
According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the Laundy family has 31 hotels in Sydney, including the Manly Pacific, with patriarch Arthur Laundy close friends with both Harvey and Singleton.
The McHugh family has this year sold the Shore Club in Manly and the Kinselas Hotel in Darlinghurst.
It is not yet known how the day-to-day operations of the Steyne Hotel will be managed by the new owners.