KEY POINTS:
Finance company Bridgecorp might be bust, but the boss's beach house just fetched a mint.
An Orewa waterfront house owned by Bridgecorp boss Rod Petricevic and his wife Mary has sold for $530,000 above valuation.
The couple's Noel Ave house beneath towering Norfolk pines was sold under the hammer for $1.73 million this week, well above the $1.2 million Quotable Value assessed its value at in 2004 for rating purposes.
Neil Prentice, Bayleys Realty Group's communications manager, said a big group bid fiercely against one another at the auction at his firm's Viaduct offices on Wednesday.
"There was strong bidding from half a dozen parties," Mr Prentice said.
Mr Petricevic is understood to have attended the auction.
But angry Bridgecorp investors can forget about sharing in any windfall. Money from the sale is unavailable to debenture or capital note owners, owed $458 million.
PricewaterhouseCoopers receivers can seize only assets directly owned by the company, and any property owned by the former finance company chief are well outside its grasp.
Christchurch lawyer Grant Cameron, who is representing investors facing losses in the Bridgecorp collapse, said Mr Petricevic's windfall would be salt in the wounds for many.
"The question remains as to how company assets may have flowed on to individuals - directors, shareholders and the like - and whether those processes were proper," Mr Cameron said.
There was already anger at the fact that Mr Petricevic had been linked to other company collapses in the past.
"There doesn't seem to be any evidence at this stage in the public arena indicating specific wrongdoing, so everybody simply has to wait."
The couple appear to have made a substantial profit on the sale. QV dates the title's last sale as April 1986 for $285,000, a time when the property was judged to be worth just $165,000.
Big Orewa sale
* The Noel Ave house went for $530,000 above Quotable Value's 2004 assessment.
* The waterfront retreat belonged to Rod Petricevic of Bridgecorp fame and his wife Mary.
* The property last sold in 1986 for $285,000.
