Billionaire who built 79,000 homes splits opinion in Australia
As prices have surged, officials have come under increasing pressure to act
[SYDNEY] Billionaire Harry Triguboff’s mark is unmistakable in the Sydney suburb of Pagewood. Where tobacco and car factories once stood, the 92-year-old is building one of Australia’s largest housing developments – row after row of tan, grey and white apartment towers and townhouses, punctuated by cafes, supermarkets and strips of green.
Meriton, his company, in September won approval for the latest stage of the A$3 billion (S$2.5 billion), 16.5-hectare (40 acre), 3,000-apartment build. To critics, it’s a “monster ugly ghetto” threatening to overwhelm local services. For Triguboff, it’s all in a day’s work.
Pagewood, Meriton’s biggest ever project, embodies the Triguboff paradox: he’s the man who’s built more reasonably-priced homes than almost anyone else, and the man derided for reshaping Sydney’s suburbs in ways some residents resent.
The formula used to develop Pagewood is one Triguboff has rolled out around Sydney, and in Queensland to the north, for decades – stacking dense apartment blocks in cities and suburban fringes.
While it has not always been a straightforward ascent, it has made him Australia’s third richest person, with a net worth of about US$21.1 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. It’s a fortune that’s swelled even as his apartment towers have split opinion and one that may grow bigger on the back of the government’s plan to help first-time buyers.
Triguboff had travelled widely and recognised the opportunity in Sydney, particularly as more migrants moved to the city and were happy to live in apartments without backyards, said Tom Forrest, chief executive officer of property developers’ lobby group, Urban Taskforce.
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“Harry was the first to deliver genuine affordable housing near transport nodes,” Forrest said, adding he had helped many working-class people get on the property ladder.
Apartment pioneer
Triguboff had seemingly soured on Sydney in recent years. In 2024, he said that he was tempted to stop buying sites because it was such a hard place to do business. But lately, following policy changes and interest rate cuts, the nonagenarian’s sentiment has improved.
As Australia’s median capital city dwelling value edges close to A$1 million, the pool of sub-A$800,000 properties is shrinking dramatically, underscoring the limited stock of affordable housing.
As prices have surged, officials have come under increasing pressure to act. One government policy shift designed to get first homebuyers into the market looks set to benefit Meriton and Triguboff. The existing First Home Guarantee Scheme was expanded in October to allow all first home buyers to purchase some lower-priced properties with a 5 per cent deposit, rather than 20 per cent. The company has more than 700 new apartments across its portfolio that qualify under the criteria, according to a recent Instagram post.
Meriton has seen a “clear upswing” in activity from first homebuyers, investors and local purchasers, Triguboff said in an Oct 3 statement.
“Finally, the government and banks are aligned in their approach,” he said. Triguboff declined to comment for this article.
Affordability crisis
Triguboff, the son of Russian Jews, arrived in Sydney from China in 1948 to finish school. He entered the property market after returning to Australia, following stints in England, Israel and South Africa.
His first two-storey, eight-apartment walk-up development sold for £25,500 (S$44,134) in 1963, about A$112,609 per apartment in today’s terms. One-bedroom starter apartments in Triguboff’s developments, which include amenities like pools, gyms, games rooms and saunas, now begin at around A$600,000.
The company was briefly listed for a few years from 1969, before Triguboff decided to take it private again in 1973. The endless meetings and board oversight nearly ruined the business, he said in his 2024 biography, High-Rise Harry, and he preferred to have the “buck stop with me in regard to all the decisions”.
Meriton’s footprint has spread in lockstep with Sydney. In six decades, he has built more than 79,000 apartments, while the population has more than doubled. It’s been the biggest apartment developer in the country for the past three years, with more than 3,000 delivered in the 2024 financial year and in 2025, according to the Housing Industry Association.
“Apartments were for hotels and New York before him,” said Housing Industry Association Managing Director Jocelyn Martin. “Apartment living has been a legacy of Harry.”
Meriton’s model of embracing economies of scale and not doing each project as a bespoke design had meant the company was able to deliver apartments more affordably, said Urban Taskforce’s Forrest.
To Triguboff, Australia’s housing woes cannot be solved by policy tweaks. He blames a confluence of construction trade unions, the central bank and governments for holding development back. In particular, he has repeatedly chafed against councils who have not shared his passion for high-rise towers.
In Sydney’s south east, the Save Little Bay group has been formed to fight against Meriton’s moves to add extra density to a proposed apartment project in the beachside suburb.
Meriton has approval to build about 450 apartments in two-to-five storey towers on the coastal site it bought in 2018, a figure it’s tried numerous times to lift to almost 2,000 dwellings, in towers as high as 22 storeys. The plans were rejected by the local council in 2020. Local MP Michael Daley in 2023 said it was “like some sort of giant, concrete zombie”. In March, Triguboff said that he was considering lodging new plans for the site.
Sparring with local councils and other governments may not be Triguboff’s job for much longer. His two grandsons are lined up to succeed him when the time comes for him to step back.
Daniel Hendler was in 2024 named as deputy managing director, while his brother Ariel is set to continue managing the 13,000 units Triguboff personally owns. The patriarch is by his own admission, working fewer hours. Daniel declined to be interviewed for this article.
In terms of inheritance, his daughters Sharon and Orna will be the “principal beneficiaries”, with the four grandchildren also beneficiaries, he said in a 2024 interview.
Still, do not count him out just yet.
“The tax department asks my people ‘where is my boat, where is my airplane, where are all the things that people have’. I say, I don’t have time for it,” he has said. “What I do here I like more than on a boat, so why bother?” BLOOMBERG
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