This article is from the Australian Property Journal archive
FUNNY Hill, home to the oldest country racecourse in Australia and the annual Binda Picnic Races, is up for grabs again – following 164 years of single-family ownership – with expectations of more than $60 million.
Located near Binda in the Southern Tablelands region, 23 kilometres north of Crookwell and 67 kilometres north of Goulburn, the 3,860-hectare has been continually developed since the 1860s. James and Felicity Carr have been improving the property for around 50 years, allowing the transition from running 45,000 dry sheep equivalents to a 2,200-head Angus cow herd.
Funny Hill had been failed to sell at auction in 2022 was put back to the market early last year with hopes of $70 million bare.
Funny Hill is currently operated as a beef production enterprise, and is also suited to mixed grazing enterprises including wool or prime lambs. Each year in March the racecourse hosts the Binda Picnic Races, which were first held in 1848.
This year’s winner of the $11,000 1,400-metre feature, the Funny Hill Cup, was six-year-old mare Crucial Witness, paying $5. On board was Michael Wade, teaming up with Canberra trainer Gratz Vella.
The largest contiguous landholding in the region, Funny Hill has rich granite soils and highly improved pastures, and a high percentage of arable land suited to perennial pasture establishment and fodder production;
Annual rainfall comes in at 763 millimetres and there is nearly 10 kilometres of Crookwell River frontage, multiple permanent creeks and 64 dams.
Funny Hill features a circa-1864 six-bedroom stone and brick homestead, a circa-1875 old schoolhouse, a 16-stand woolshed built in 1906, and the 1907 shearer’s mess and stables. There is also grain storage and a hangar.
Inglis Rural Property is running the expressions of interest campaign, which is closing on November 12th.
