A Red Hill home on Mugga Way has set the highest recorded sales price for the year but the result could have been eclipsed by a secret sale.

Number 23 Mugga Way – a four-bedroom residential estate on almost two acres – has just been sold through an expression of interest process for $4.38 million.

The home featured a largely intact 1927 cottage that had been added to with a striking architecturally-designed extension.

A light and airy breeze room links the modern wing to the original three-bedroom cottage.

The sale was negotiated through sales agent Andrew Chamberlain from Peter Blackshaw Manuka and Berkely Residential's Bill Lyristakis.

The price beat the $4 million paid for 3 Vancouver Street, Red Hill in June – the previous record for 2013, according to data from Australian Property Monitors.

But the home across the road at 20 Mugga Way is believed to have been sold for more than $4.38 million recently in a secret off-market sale.

The home was tipped to be the territory's first to reach a $10 million price tag.

But sources say while it did not exchange for this record-breaking amount it did sell “well in excess” of the other Mugga Way mansion sold on the market in full view of the public.

Real Estate Institute of the ACT president Michael Kumm said only a few transactions were conducted in such a fashion each year with relatively few people wanting to keep sales private.

He said this was not linked just to top end homes in the territory but across the board home sellers sometimes enacted confidentiality clauses in sales contracts.

Number 23 Mugga Way was the first house to be built in Red Hill and was approved on the same day as Calthorpe’s House, which was constructed next door.

Media baron Rupert Murdoch’s News Limited acquired the property and the one behind it on Wickham Crescent during a business takeover of the Herald and the Weekly Times in 1987.

The Mugga Way home underwent extensive restorations in the mid-1990s as part of a proposed super estate combining both blocks that never eventuated.

The home was sold for $1.16 million at auction in 1997 to information technology executive Vikram Sharma and 8 Wickham Crescent sold two years later for $1.6 million.

The Mugga Way house was sold again in 2002 for $2.05 million.

Berkely Residential’s Bill Lyristakis, who has sold the Mugga Way residence three times, said it was quite an unusual property but the huge block of land and views made it something quite special.

Peter Blackshaw Manuka sales agent Andrew Chamberlain described the home at number 23 as quirky but on a great block of land.

“It was one of the best half dozen blocks of land in the ACT in my opinion,” he said.

Mr Chamberlain said there had been five expressions of interest offers made for amounts more than $4 million so there was definitely a market for higher end homes in the ACT.

He said there had been several sales of top end properties in the last few months following caution by buyers earlier in the year before the federal election.

Mr Chamberlain said this recovery due to increased certainty in the future was good news for the ACT, which was not following the booming Sydney market.

“Whilst we're not seeing anything like a boom it certainly augurs well for what the future holds for Canberra,” he said.

“Next year is looking pretty promising.”