- Sir Patrick Hogan’s plan for a medical hub and unique residential subdivision in Cambridge is proceeding.
- The first sections of the bespoke estate will be available from March 27, managed by grandson Liam Hunt.
- The subdivision features 32 lots with strict design covenants, ensuring high-quality, architecturally unique homes.
Sir Patrick Hogan’s ambitious plan to build a new neighbourhood in which no house can look the same is going ahead, three years after the horse racing legend’s death.
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The first sections in the bespoke residential estate outside of Cambridge will hit the market for sale on March 27.
Sir Patrick and his wife, Lady Hogan, bought the large chunk of land on Victoria Street in Cambridge in 2021 with their friend, Dr Luk Chin.
The couple had bought into Chin’s plan to establish a large medical hub in the growing town. But they also decided to create a bespoke subdivision on some of the remaining land.
Sun Estate is a bespoke 32-lot subdivision just 2km outside of Cambridge. Photo / Supplied
Sir Patrick and Lady Hogan had just sold their renowned Cambridge Stud four years earlier and planned to build a home for themselves in the subdivision.
Sir Patrick died in 2023, but his grandson, Liam Hunt, has stepped in to manage his family’s interests in the project.
Chin remains focused on developing the Cambridge Health Hub while Hunt spearheads the residential development, dubbed Sun Estate.
Work on the 7500sqm medical hub is not slated to start until the end of the year, once all of the health service providers are confirmed. The final stage of the project – a 42-townhouse development called Bijou – is still at least a year away.
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Hunt said his grandmother was now living in a retirement village, but the family still wanted the development to be a place where his grandparents would have been happy to live.
“We were thinking about how we would want the subdivision to look if we were wanting to live there,” Hunt told OneRoof.
"My nana walks every day – so she could have got a coffee, gone out for lunch and also come back and not feel like she had a neighbour right next door to her. I guess for those people who come off farms, it’s hard to go from having all that land around you to nothing.”
The slightly larger 711-899sqm sections speak to the fact that buyers didn’t want to be hemmed in, and there are specific covenants in place to ensure all the homes have good street appeal and are of a high quality.
Sir Patrick and his wife, Lady Hogan, bought the large landholding outside Cambridge in 2021. Photo / Supplied
“We wanted to ensure all the houses around were nice, bespoke and architecturally designed,” Hunt said.
St Kilda’s, another lifestyle subdivision on the outskirts of Cambridge, has been extremely popular with homeowners, and the aim, Hunt said, was to create a similar subdivision closer to Cambridge.
Of the 32 lots in the subdivision, eight are already under contract, and 24 are being listed for sale on Friday, with prices starting at $620,000. In a nod to the renowned breeder, the streets are named after his prized thoroughbred stallions, Sir Tristram and Tavistock.
Anyone wanting to build in Sun Estate must have their plans signed off by a design committee. The rules state that no home in the subdivision can be the same; that they must be architecturally designed; and that they must be a single standalone home of at least 180sqm size and use certain cladding materials and fencing. The extensive covenants also specify that recreational vehicles parked on the property must be screened and that residents are only allowed two domestic pets.
Lodge agent Kane Jacobson, who is marketing the sections with Cambridge Real Estate agent Paulette Bell, said the sections were larger than most of the other ones currently on the market for sale in the town.
The feedback so far had been positive because people wanted something different from the standard “cookie-cutter” home in a cookie-cutter subdivision.
“You don’t want the same house, just a different colour and a different brick, right next to you,” Bell said.
“It’s a point of difference. You want to step outside your front door and have something just as beautiful as your home next to you.”
The subdivision isn’t the only one in Cambridge with a horse-riding pedigree. Cambridge locals Tony and Vicki Rider, who operate a thoroughbred nursery and equestrian facility, are planning to create a new residential community on their land.
The proposed residential development comprises 98.6ha of land at the Milan Park Stud site, between Maungatautari Road and Wordsworth Street.
“If we get the green light to proceed, the first stage would provide housing for around 35-40 families,” Tony said in a press release. “We are committed to staging the development in a sustainable manner.”
