Who is the tycoon behind the latest Port Douglas development project?
Shire industry
New plans for a 40-home estate have been unveiled on the more than 2ha block at 71-85 Port Douglas Road where a luxury resort was once meant to go, but who is the man behind the latest development announcement?
Brisbane multi-millionaire Kevin Seymour and his family came in at number 190 on the Australian Financial Review Rich List last year with a net worth of $794m.
RELATED STORIES
Housing estate plan for former luxury resort site
High-profile block where scrapped luxury resort was set to go now under contract
Sale of Port Douglas Road land to go to super-scam victims
Property developer the Seymour Group has already made a small investment by its standards in Port Douglas in 2021 in the form of the 15-home Beach Estate on Langley Road near Four Mile Beach, but this is a mere drop in the ocean compared to the alterations it has made to the Brisbane skyline since the company was first formed in 1976.
The Seymour Group has built some of the Brisbane CBD’s major precincts including Post Office Square and Queens Plaza and has constructed a host of residential developments including The Oxlade and The Peninsula at New Farm.
In 1995 The Group built the first high-rise residential tower in the Brisbane CBD, the 150-apartment Admiralty Towers, which soon included two more towers and more than 300 more homes.
Other projects across Queensland include at Noosa and Airlie Beach.
One of the group's latest mega-projects is Newstead Green, which takes up an entire block and includes more than 800 apartments, eight towers - some of which may end up being more than 30 storeys high - and a retail precinct.
The North Newstead development has attracted its fair share of controversy after a company building a nearby housing and commercial estate challenged the project in court.
The challenge was settled out of court in March, but the Seymours then lodged a fresh application to increase the size of the towers from maximum building heights of 15 storeys to 33 storeys.
In 2020 the group set a new auction record for a single Queensland block, with Kevin’s grandson Ben Seymour bidding $9.9m for an about 1200sq m riverfront pair of homes at 25 Maxwell St, New Farm.
That record has been overtaken many times since, and the Group put the property back on the market in late 2024 for an undisclosed price.
Seymour Group PR states Kevin has “shaped Brisbane’s central business district through his prestige developments" and has “introduced the apartment tower concept to Brisbane”.
“He is a leader with real vision,” the Group states.
Time will tell how much the Seymour family will shape Port Douglas going forward.
