A multi-million-dollar log cabin with links to Hollywood and Grand Designs has hit the market for sale in Auckland’s Franklin district.
The three-bedroom property at 177A Jones Road, in Hūnua, was built by Rotorua craftsman Derek Mullooly, whose creations have wowed audiences and homeowners alike.
Mullooly’s firm, NZ Log Homes, built the ranger’s cabin in the live-action Yogi Bear movie shot in New Zealand and brought to life one of the standout homes featured in Grand Designs New Zealand.
Mullooly built 177A Jones Road in the mid-1990s but the current owner lured him back to carry out a full-scale upgrade.
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The owner, who asked not to be named, paid $1.165 million for the property last October. It was in a run-down state and he had been looking for a renovation project.
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He told OneRoof that restoring the cabin to its former glory was challenging but worth it.
“Every external post has been replaced. Over 4000 hours have gone into sanding back every log to bare and recoating them,” he said. “The amount of work that’s gone into it is just unbelievable.”
The bathrooms and kitchens are modern and external wooden tongue and groove boards have been painted in contemporary colours.
The grounds have also been given a makeover, with the property now boasting views of the Sky Tower and Rangitoto. “You couldn’t even tell there was a view. Now you’ve got this incredible view,” the owner said.
He added: “The owners who built it were in their 80s, so it all became a bit much for them."
The builder who originally created the cabin was hired to carry out the renovation. Photo / Supplied
It took more than 4000 hours to sand back the wood and bring it up to scratch. Photo / Supplied
The owner had bought all the furniture from the previous owners so that the building and painting teams could live there during the week (he has never lived at the property, and owns a lifestyle block nearby).
“Some days there were 15, 16 people up there,” he said.
The 2021 CV is $1.9m and does not take into account the recent renovation, however, Mullooly told OneRoof that the upgraded home would cost around $3m to build from scratch in today’s market.
Ray White listing agent Drew Sackfield, who is marketing the cabin with colleague Jay Singh, said she loved the cosiness of the home and felt that it would appeal to families and couples.
Her listing on OneRoof declares the house to be a "once in a lifetime opportunity" and that the owner had given clear instructions that it “must be sold”.
Mullooly told OneRoof he had built more than 80 log homes in New Zealand since starting his business in 1982. He became interested in log homes during his OE in Canada where he informally apprenticed himself to a local builder.
The grounds have been cleared and landscaped. Photo / Supplied
On returning to New Zealand at the beginning of the 1980s, Mullooly started building log homes.
Around half of Mullooly’s customers in New Zealand have been immigrants from countries where log homes are common, such as the Netherlands, Switzerland and Germany.
He buys logs for the homes directly from a forestry company near to his Rotorua base. “We give the company the specs. The size of the logs we want. the length of the logs. They harvest it for us and then send it to our yard. From there, we debark the logs ourselves by hand, and then it’s all hand built.”
The Hūnua home is one of the largest Mullooly has built over the years, although his favourite is the cabin he built for himself, but which he no longer owns, in Hurunui.
New Zealand Log Homes has recently renovated another home that’s currently on the market for sale – 847 West Coast Road, in Oratia, Auckland. The five-bedroom, five-bathroom home is for sale by negotiation and has a CV of $2.35m.
- 177A Jones Road, in Hūnua, Auckland, is for sale, deadline closing October 2
