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A neighborhood fight over access to a dilapidated boathouse enjoyed by media personality Eddie McGuire has been decided by a judge after the TV star testified in the case.
Warring neighbors Ann Hyams and Helen Blythe, who live at a site in Portsea on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula known as ‘Millionaire’s Walk’, took their dispute to the Victoria County Court in a costly civil trial that It ended last week, months later. began.
The suburb is home to some of Australia’s richest people, with transport magnate Lindsay Fox’s palatial mansion located a stone’s throw from feuding neighbours.
The dispute centered on a boathouse at the foot of the cliffs in Port Phillip Bay, where former Millionaire Hot Seat presenter Eddie McGuire was a tenant.
Ms. Blythe prevented Ms. Hyams and, by extension, McGuire from accessing the shed, prompting Ms. Hyams to file a lawsuit.
Mrs Blythe is the widow of the once-wealthy businessman Brian Blythe, who was once boss and then president of the cleaning and catering company, Spotless Group, and She is also the mother of Laura McLachlan, the wife of AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan.
A boat shed has sparked a dispute in one of Australia’s wealthiest suburbs – Portsea, on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula.
Former Millionaire Hot Seat host Eddie McGuire leased the boathouse for $100,000 a year in 2009 and batted for Ann Hyams.
The boathouse is accessed by stairs leading up to the cliff.
In a double blow, Judge Brimer ordered that Ms Hyams be granted access to the property and that Ms Blythe pay Ms Hyams’ legal costs, which are likely to run into the tens of thousands of dollars.
Eddie’s intervention
The former Millionaire Hot Seat host was among those who defended Ms Hyams and testified at the trial.
McGuire signed a long-term lease on the then-$10 million Somerset Avenue property for about $100,000 a year in 2008.
He told the court he had enjoyed exclusive use of the boathouse while living at the mansion, called ‘Shelley Roc’.
“Mr McGuire stated that it was always possible to walk from the Boatshed through the bush to the other boatshed at Mileura (owned by Ms Blythe),” Judge Brimer said in her ruling.
The court heard the McGuires stayed at Shelley Roc throughout the summer and periodically during the winter and at weekends.
“Mr McGuire was friends with members of the wider Blythe family before renting Shelley Roc to the plaintiffs in 2008,” Judge Brimer said.
“Socializing with them, including in and out of the two boathouses, was part of the McGuires’ use and enjoyment of the Shelley Roc lease.”
The court heard that the McGuires had helped maintain the boathouse and the staircase leading to it, including installing a locked gate that bore a “Private Property” sign.
AFL boss Gillon McLachlan and his wife Laura McLachlan. Mrs. McLachlan is the daughter of Helen Blythe.
Documents and photographs published in WhatsNew2Day Australia show the boathouse nestled in bushes next to the iconic Shelley Beach.
The stairs leading to the boathouse were also the subject of hot dispute, as were a boat ramp and an old well.
Dispute in the shed
In a document submitted to the court, Mrs Hyams claimed that the shed and everything else attached to it had been used exclusively by her family, her tenants and guests for decades.
Mrs Blythe and her now deceased husband were the former owners of what is now transport and real estate billionaire Paul Little’s historic Coonac home on Clendon Road in Toorak, one of the exclusive suburb’s largest properties.
The house attached to the controversial boathouse had originally been built by Walter Waldemar Pisterman, who died in 1989 leaving the property to Mrs Hyams.
The court order said Ms Hyams was entitled to the shed through an “adverse possession claim”, which is a property law principle that allows a person to claim ownership of the land without paying for it after 15 years of exclusive use of it.
Ms Hyams claimed Mr Pisterman built the shed around 1958, using it to store beach equipment, swimming accessories, boat accessories, watercraft and for recreational purposes when he attended Shelley Beach.
“The boathouse was the main access point to the beach from the plaintiffs’ titled land, and it was noted that there was no direct access to the beach other than through the boathouse via the stairs of the cliff from the land with title to the plaintiffs,” the letter said.
‘The boathouse can only be accessed via a locked staircase connecting the plaintiffs’ titled land or from a locked gate at the end of the beach.
“Prior to his death, the Estate and Walter controlled the keys and access to the Boat Shed and only provided keys and access to his tenants and guests.”
Billionaire trucker Lindsay Fox lives right down the street from warring neighbors.
Portsea is home to some of the most expensive homes in Australia
Ms Hyams claimed that Mr Pisterman and then his estate had exercised “exclusive occupation and control of the boathouse since its construction around 1958”.
He claimed that the original owner of the disputed land reached an agreement with Mr. Pisterman giving him permission to build and use the boathouse on his land in exchange for a nominal annual fee and permission to share the use of the boathouse’s water pump. well.
However, the court heard no such fees were ever paid for the use of the boathouse.
Tension over ownership of the boathouse boiled over in 2021, when Hyams claimed that people acting on Blythe’s behalf had locks installed on her door.
Ms Blythe had purchased the property in 1997 and applied for a new title in 2019 which she said voided the previous boathouse agreement.
In a defense submitted to the court, Ms Blythe claimed that her family had paid rates and land taxes for the disputed land since its purchase and that the land had always been theirs.
In handing down his decision, Judge Brimer determined that Ms. Hyams had a right to the property due to the length of time Mr. Pisterman was in possession of it.
“The title to the disputed land became extinguished on or about November 1, 1974,” he said.
‘Mrs Hyams had always believed that the Disputed Land was part of Shelley Roc. It was only in 2019, when she was preparing Shelley Roc for a possible sale, that she realized that the land in dispute, including the Boatshed, was not in Shelley Roc but in Mileura.
