Meriton’s Harry Triguboff speaks exclusively to “The Bill.”

August 01 2006 – Domain.com.au feature article from The Bill

The following article appeared in August 2006 on the domain.com.au website.

Interview with Harry Triguboff

Author: Tyron Hyde, The Washington Brown Group
Date: August 01, 2006

Billionaire property developer Harry Triguboff has transformed Sydney. His developments brought thousands of people back to live in the CBD in the 1990s, with the 78-storey World Square tower as his masterpiece.

Q: Where was your first development? What was it, and was it profitable?

Smith Street, Tempe. It was eight two-bedroom apartments. It cost 17,000 pounds and then sold for 26,000 pounds. It was very profitable. And I was thrilled with this effort.

Q: Over the next year, where would you put your money? Industrial, commercial or residential?

All in residential because I’ll always be assured of a tenant. Due to under-supply, rents continue to rise, and eventually, the prices will skyrocket.

Q: If you were given $20,000 to invest today, where would you spend it?

I would buy mining shares.

Q: What is your favourite of the many projects you have been involved in? And why?

I love them all. But I must always say World Tower is the tallest and the most beautiful. I did my best in all I have built. One must understand a lot of time is wasted on democracy, and beauty is sacrificed.

Q: What’s the best developer decision you have ever made?

When I bought the ACI site.

Q: What is the hardest thing about being a developer in Australia?

The hardest thing about being a developer in Australia is to cope with the fact that we have no people and are not making an effort to make Australia a more prominent place.

The second problem is that we have this great fear of inflation when we are the cheapest country in the world.

And the third problem is that we have a horrible bureaucracy with crazy rules.

Q: We often hear about big projects coming undone because of “cost blow-outs”. How do successful developers contain costs?

In my opinion, one person should be the developer and the builder. And if costs blow up in the building site, then there is still profit to be made as a developer.

On the other hand, if the market goes down, the builder could still make a profit. But by being only a builder or only a developer, one could get into a bit of trouble.

Q: Put aside planning restrictions, heritage orders and so on: as a developer, what site in Australia would you love to get your hands on and what would you like to build there?

I love the South Sydney area. And I have picked up the best sites over there, and I am very glad that I’ve done them; if the market becomes better, I have my eyes on another site not far from South Sydney, which I will probably buy. But it will have to wait until the market improves.

Q: What have significant influences in your life as a developer?

Major influences in my life as a developer are the way we deal with the unions, the way we deal with the labour force, and the way we deal with people in general, with the banks. To be a developer, you must be pretty clever in dealing with all those different bodies. And they influence your life, and you are never the same again.

Q: Please finish this statement: “If I hadn’t been a property developer, I would have been ….”

A historian. But I’m glad I am a property developer and not a historian because I make things, and a historian only talks about things.