Dairy farmer Travis Cox buys Holbrook's Stonehaven for $11m
Fresh from selling his Katunga dairy farm to Robert Costa and Liam Lenaghan’s GoFarm almond venture, fourth-generation dairy farmer Travis Cox and his wife Julia have bought the well-known Stonehaven rural holding near Holbrook for about $11 million.
It is only the second time that 1295-hectare Stonehaven has changed hands, having been owned by the Ross family for more than a century.
Stonehaven once formed part of the Ross family’s 36,000-hectare Kinross sheep and cattle breeding empire established in 1867 by Alexander Ross, before it was hived off in 1933.
Stonehaven remained in the hands of descendants Neil and Jacqui Ross until 2016 when they sold up to move to Albury.
Property records show Stonehaven, which lies 19 kilometres north of Holbrook at 269 Stonehaven Road, was bought from the Ross family by Kincardine Pastoral in February 2016 for $9 million.
Kincardine Pastoral is a collaboration of three local farming families led by the Durnans, who own Widgiewa Station in Morundah, west of Wagga Wagga. The other families are the Boers and Finlays.
The Weekly Times reported in June the families were selling “due to a restructure of their businesses”.
The new owners of Stonehaven, Travis and Julia Cox, sold their Bembaala Farms aggregation in Katunga in Victoria’s Goulburn Valley to fruit and vegetable king Robert Costa’s GoFarm earlier this year. GoFarm has so far raised $31 million for its Akuna Trust to buy up dairy farms in the Katunga region with plans to convert them to higher yielding almond orchards.
Title deeds show the Coxes sold Bembaala Farms to Akuna Holdings for $7.1 million, below the $18 million they had hoped to achieve as a productive dairy farm when it was first put up for sale in September 2017.
The sale of Stonehaven was handled by David Gittoes and Nick Myer of Elders Real Estate, who declined to comment.
Stonehaven was marketed as suitable for grain, fodder and livestock production with a carrying capacity of 18,000 dry sheep equivalents (DSE).
A feature of the property is its California bungalow-styled seven-bedroom homestead dating back to the 1920s that includes a country kitchen, billiards room and swimming pool.
Working improvements include a woolshed, sheepyards, steel cattleyards and six silos, while water infrastructure comprises 22 dams and two groundwater bores.
When the campaign to sell Stonehaven kicked off less than two months ago, Mr Gittoes highlighted the work put into upgrading the property and improving the soil quality.
“The end result is a property that has the ability to run a lot of stock and grow crops,” he said.
“The substantial pasture improvement program has more than doubled the carrying capacity in recent years and the property shows excellent returns,” he said.
