Alleged fraudster Bill Papas celebrated Christmas and the new year in Greece, evading arrest by Australian authorities, liquidators have quietly sold his inner west home for about $4.4 million as reported by the SMH
The sale comes as Mr Papas’s luxury waterfront retreats on the NSW Central Coast are set to hit the market with record-setting price expectations of $12 million and $9 million each.
Mr Papas’s four-bedroom home in Rozelle is his registered address in Australia but was held in a beneficial trust of which the director was his Melbourne-based business associate Vincenzo Tesoriero. Mr Papas is a beneficiary of the trust along with Mr Tesoriero, a court has heard.
The rumoured sale price remains unconfirmed given no comment by CobdenHayson’s Benjamin Martin, but property records confirm the sale.
Westpac lodged a caveat on the title of Mr Papas’s property interests last July, soon after it went public with allegations his equipment leasing and managed services provider company Forum Finance had been using false invoices and forged signatures to obtain loans without the consent of at least seven of the bank’s corporate clients.
Mr Papas’s luxury property interests include neighbouring waterfront holiday homes in Wagstaffe complete with a private jetty and boat shed, the first of which was purchased in 2019 by another beneficial trust directed by Mr Papas and Mr Tesoriero, for $5.8 million.
