Chinese buyer purchases Australia's most expensive apartment

A design sketch of the Australia 108 tower. [Photo/Agencies]

A Chinese businessman looking for a Melbourne base has purchased Australia's most expensive apartment - a penthouse in Melbourne's tallest apartment tower, Australia 108 - for $25 million, agencies reported.

The 750-square-meter penthouse spans the entire top of the 319-meter skyscraper, one of a number of high rise buildings approved for construction in the inner-city suburb of the second largest city on the Aussie continent, the report said.

The buyer worked with designers to customize the apartment, which has a few unique features. The apartment will have its own glass lift, which rises from a private entrance foyer on level 98, two storeys to the top of level 100 and provides a 360-degree view of the city.

It will also contain a three-storey staircase, an enormous kitchen and at least four bedrooms with huge, walk-in wardrobes.

Construction has started on the tower, which is due to be completed in 2019.

The Chinese buyer is a very private and extremely wealthy Chinese national with a family who spends time in New York, London and various parts of China, as well as Melbourne, where he spends roughly three months of the year, Andrew Leoncelli, the main real estate agent in charge of the sales of the building, was quoted as saying in the report.

Chinese buyers are currently purchasing around 12 percent of new homes in Australia, said an early report that analyzed Australian real estate and its Chinese investors.

The report quoted global investment bank Credit Suisse's analysis that Chinese investors and newly arrived immigrants have spent about $24 billion on Australian property over the past seven years.