Luxe Listings Sydney

Point Piper, Vaucluse, Dover Heights, harbour views, flashy cars, swimming pools, popping champagne -welcome to the world of Luxe Listings Sydney.

If The Block is about aspirational home renovations for Aussies, Amazon Prime Video’s new series is unashamedly Millionaire’s Row. And it very firmly has its sights set on global horizons.

This is spank-alicious, real estate voyeurism, drowning in envy and expertly skewered through modern reality tropes. Your eyes will be watering at these glossy abodes, all of which seem to come with 7 bedrooms, 5 bathrooms, harbour views and luxury fittings.

Yet it’s the casting that also helps this to pop off the screen, with three savage real estate professionals: agents Gavin Rubinstein & D’Leanne Lewis and buyer’s agent Simon Cohen. All three are young, hungry and at the top of their game, crossing paths at inspections, auctions and -strategically- social events. Think Real Housewives meets property porn.

Gavin Rubinstein was awarded Ray White’s number 1 salesperson from 2013 – 2019 and runs his sales team like a tactical unit. He’s on a mission to secure listings and land top price for multi-level mansions in Vaucluse and Dover Heights. Properties that cross his portfolio are easily $10m a pop, but he’s a pint-sized smiling assassin and determined to drive the price up.

Simon Cohen is a buyer’s agent and founder of Cohen Handler,  the largest Property Buyer’s Agency in Australia. He may swim in the same circles but he’s looking to drive down the prices of Sydney’s high-end properties, as he represents local and international clients who all have millions to drop -if they can find the perfect property.

D’Leanne Lewis is a Principal of Laing+Simmons Double Bay, and like Gavin Rubinstein, she is an agent for the very best in Sydney properties. But while she admits to high demands she also has an appreciation for historic homes and sees her peers as obsessed with “flashy suits, fast cars …a bit w*nkerish really.”

This dynamic works well within the buy-and-sell premise, if manipulated through a reality lens. All three know how to punch up their quotes for the genre: “Just trying to take over the world,” “I have been called a Rottweiler in heels,” “You shovel shit,” “I’m willing to take a chance. She’s got 30 days.”

Like the Housewives franchise, there are parties and events where our trio socialise and cross swords as friendly rivals. Do we really buy it? Does it really matter if it leads to conflict?

There’s also touches of personal lives: D’Leanne hiring a new staff intern, Simon taking his associate Tammy to a family dinner where his parents ramp up the pressure for marriage. This was insightful into the Jewish faith, if stretching on too long.

But it’s the homes we are here to see and Eureka cameras are dripping in the property porn.

Like Selling Sunset and Million Dollar Listing, Sydney’s most expensive suburbs were there for the taking, and it’s surprising this hasn’t been attempted earlier. Adorned by the spectacular harbour, Amazon Prime is doubtless seeing this as having international appeal -which probably explains the American hip hop and R&B soundtrack. Sorry Paul Kelly and Barnesy…

The opening episode works its way up to an auction tease before credits roll. I’d prefer a format with a  pay-off each episode, but it is clever to draw you into a second. Thirty minutes would have also been tighter than the one hour, some of which is decidedly filler.

But no matter how fabulous the properties, none of it would work without the three cast who all deliver for the cameras.

With no shortage of glossy properties, Luxe Listings Sydney knows its turf and looks set for a long run.

Friday July 9 on Amazon Prime Video.