‘Sick of paying Point Piper prices’: Lavish party host Di Maloney disputes $100m debts claims

For good reason, Point Piper local Di Maloney is well known for her no-expense-spared parties: Guest lists of up to 800 people, free-flowing champagne, caviar stands, light shows, live entertainment, smoke machines, a state-of-the-art sound system and staging for her DJ son Ryan.

Security staff guard the entry on Australia’s most expensive street as throngs of 20-somethings, many of them from Sydney’s richest families, crowd into the trophy home and on to a prized tennis court. Locals have long joked that the noise keeps the lions awake at Taronga Zoo.

But more recently, Maloney’s generosity as a hostess is being overshadowed by bill disputes, putting her at odds with contractors, her professional advisers and the recently appointed receivers of her Plaza Hotel business who are collectively pursuing business debts said to total $100 million.

As Maloney gears up for a slew of legal battles, private would-be creditors have lodged mortgages on the titles of her Point Piper home, a second family home on the oceanfront at Tamarama and the Plaza Hotel venue (previously known as Star Bar).

Meanwhile, there’s a bankruptcy notice with Maloney’s name on it that is set to be challenged in the Federal Court next month.

Maloney isn’t having any of it. “I’m not someone who doesn’t pay her bills, [but] I’m sick of paying Point Piper prices. A lot of these people are just loading up my bills,” said Maloney. “Am I not allowed to dispute a bill in a commercial arrangement?”

Bankruptcy notices do not indicate that someone is bankrupt, and Maloney is expected to defend the charge issued by CharterLaw Legal that arose from a cost assessment: Maloney says it was filed previously by another of her former lawyers without her input and that it had been issued after her former lawyer failed to respond in time.

As for the appointment of receivers to her landmark Plaza Hotel business, Maloney dubs it a stitch-up.

Maloney, who describes herself as a lawyer, said she has not been provided any formal evidence showing the validity of the receivership, and to that end, she is currently compiling a 10-page complaint to the corporate regulator disputing the underlying loan and the conduct of the lender.

“I’m not commenting on what the debt is, OK. I don’t even know what it is. The debt is yet to be determined,” she said.

Maloney was locked out of the Plaza Hotel in March, the same day records were lodged with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission showing Newpoint Advisory’s Costa Nicodemou was appointed receiver of Plaza Hotel Group Operations Pty Ltd and Plaza Hotel Group Holdings Pty Ltd.

There was no response to inquiries from Nicodemou.

New management led by hoteliers Simon Tilley and Nick Wills were brought in to run the Plaza Hotel earlier this month.

As for the contractors listed on Local Court lists who say they are owed money – a house painter from Maroubra, a liquor wholesaler and a gardener from Rushcutters Bay – Maloney said some of the claims were simply a matter of people rushing to the courts instead of chasing up sometimes misplaced or overlooked invoices. The liquor wholesaler being a case in point.

Maloney said there was sometimes confusion over whether she had paid already through another contractor, as in the case of the painter.

As for a recent judgment debt of $43,484 owed to horticulturalist business McIntosh & Bowman Gardens, Maloney disputes it.

Maloney also contests suggestions that her parties are extravagant indulgences.

“They’re usually for my kids. I often don’t even go,” she said. “Just because they’re in my house doesn’t mean I’m hosting the party.”

Days later, Maloney clarifies to say the parties are about building a brand as a top party venue at the Point Piper house and leveraging off that to create the same sort of brand for the Plaza Hotel.

Guests to some of the marquee events have described a Halloween party in which the tennis court was transformed into a cemetery complete with tombstones; a pool party for which the court was festooned in cabanas and paddle pools; and a tropical beach party for Ryan for which three tonnes of washed sand was bucketed in to the back patio, bar area and swimming pool.

“It was because I had the name of having glamorous events that the pub got any traction whatsoever. You think I was going to get it from being the Star Bar,” Maloney said.

Maloney credits her son Ryan and her daughter Sarah for much of that success: Ryan for designing the nightclub and DJ space, and Sarah for introducing her branded content and influencers to the venue.

“If anything, the foundation of the hotel, and any of the success of the hotel, came from this house. I had to bring the glamour from here, from these extravagant parties, and try to convert that to the hotel, which worked to a high degree,” she said.

Sarah Maloney, 26, is no stranger to the influencers of Instagram and TikTok, judging by her estimated 70,000 followers across both platforms curating content for her fashion brand, when not flying first-class to Europe for the summer or, most recently, to California for Coachella.

Ryan Maloney, 24, is known as a DJ, playing at his mother’s Plaza Hotel until earlier this year and more recently on the Gold Coast at the Need2Freak event at Easter.

The family’s oceanfront property in Tamarama doubles as an entertainment venue for Ryan’s sponsored parties. He drives a black Lamborghini.

How it happened

It has been a tumultuous decade since Maloney split from her former husband, fellow hotelier Kim Maloney, of the Maloney Hotels Group that owns the Hotel Bondi, Maloney’s Hotel, the Shark Hotel, the Clock Hotel at Surfer’s Paradise, among others.

The Point Piper mansion that the Maloneys purchased in 2001 from fashion designer Lisa Ho and rag trader Philip Smouha was debt-free when it was transferred into her name as part of her divorce settlement in 2020.

Likewise, the Plaza Hotel venue was debt-free when it was transferred to her as part of the divorce. The three-storey building with a heritage facade on George Street was purchased in 2002 for about $11.5 million when it was part of the Planet Hollywood restaurant chain.

But soon after Maloney took over the pub in late 2020, the whole building was slapped with a fire safety order, requiring significant rectification works. It left the hotel shuttered for the next four years.

“It cost me over $7 million to get rid of the fire order, and during that time I got no income from it,” she said.

Costs blew out further on the back of a major renovation of the venue. There was more than $4 million in works to one contractor alone.

By early 2025, with the major redesign complete, the venue reopened as the Plaza Hotel, featuring a record bar, a bistro and a nightclub designed by her son Ryan. The site includes a three-level commercial building in which Maloney’s penchant for all things Chanel is on show in an office suite inspired by the Paris apartment of Coco Chanel.

In a bid to pay for it all, Maloney was introduced to colourful eastern suburbs businessman “Big” Jim Byrnes, a former bankruptcy adviser to the late Alan Bond, who describes himself as a corporate adviser to the family offices of high-net-worth families.

Financing followed from Hong Kong investment management giant Pacific Alliance Group by way of a British Virgin Islands-registered entity, Rodez Breeze Development VI Limited.

Included in the financing was the block of five apartments on the Tamarama oceanfront that is currently Ryan’s home. It was bought in 2022 for $29.2 million, setting a record for the east’s oceanfront suburbs.

It was expected that the loan would be refinanced last year, but a slew of unexpected obstacles prompted Maloney to go to another non-banker lender, Vance Finance. A nine-month loan of $6.15 million was agreed last November on annual interest rates of 19.8 per cent to 36 per cent.

The Rodez Breeze loan was estimated to have reached $100 million by those familiar with the terms before it was sold early this year. Senior directors of Avari Capital have since been appointed to the Rodez Breeze entity.

Meanwhile, Maloney has fallen out with half a dozen of her former lawyers and accountants. Among them are Green & Associates law firm, which recouped costs of almost $100,000 after a caveat was lodged on her Point Piper home in 2022, and Ryan Walker Legal, which recouped costs of about $150,000.

Most notably, Maloney launched legal action in 2022 over a cost assessment of a $2.5 million legal bill. In a Supreme Court judgment handed down the following year, Maloney was ordered to not only pay the original fees, but also almost $200,000 in additional costs.

As Maloney awaits her day in the Federal Court next month to dispute the bankruptcy notice issued by CharterLaw Legal, estimated by Maloney at close to $100,000, she still has her supporters.

Byrnes described Maloney as one of the kindest people he’s ever met. “She’s been very, very generous to many people, but sadly she’s wasted too much money on people who don’t deserve it, and she’s made a few bad decisions.”