Confessions of a property guru: Making millions and losing some
15 minutes to read
Jane Phare is a senior business reporter for the New Zealand Heraldjane.phare@nzme.co.nz
Property syndication guru Mark Francis talks to Jane Phare about building up Augusta to prepare for takeover, his network of friendships and how Covid-19 knocked millions off his wealth. Posing for photos outside his grand office entrance, there s a moment when Mark Francis looks almost mournful.
Guarding the office suite are two massive bronze doors, the handles forming a stylish A for Augusta. Named after the course which hosts the US Masters golf tournament, Augusta has been Francis baby for 20 years. Now, after last year s buyout by ASX-listed Centuria Capital in a deal worth around $169m, it will disappear.
Credit WAMC
In early January, WMHT and other PBS stations ran a feature film from 2019 starring Glenda Jackson as part of their Masterpiece series. It’s called Elizabeth Is Missing, and its available on DVD and streaming on PBS Passport. Looking haggard at the age of 85, Jackson proves that her acting ability is in topnotch condition, even as her wrinkled face and scrawny physique show advanced age. She embodies the lead character of Maud Horsham, a woman who is sinking, or has sunk, into dementia.
Elizabeth Is Missing is a UK production shot in Paisley, Scotland. Andrea Gibb wrote the screenplay, which is based on a novel by Emma Healey. Gibb has quite a resume, having penned episodes of PBS series Sanditon and Call the Midwife, as well as such humanist feature films as AfterLife about a journalist who cares for a sister with Downs Syndrome and Dear Frankie, the story of a mother who forges letters and hires a stranger to pose as her young son’s missing father.