Maybe it's Gina Rinehart???

Strange but true: John Hancock rents next door to Gina Rinehart

Joe AstonColumnist

Updated Apr 10, 2015 – 6.00am,first published at 1.59am

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Unless you've spent the last five years living under a rock, you'd be well aware that Australia's richest person Gina Rinehart is estranged from her son John Hancock.

Hancock and sisters Bianca Rinehart and Hope Welker (who later withdrew from the action) went to the Supreme Court of NSW in 2011 to remove their mother as trustee of the family trust, which owns 25 per cent of Hancock Prospecting. She has since relinquished the role. Hancock and Bianca Rinehart are also pursuing their mother in the Federal Court for a larger stake in Hancock Prospecting.

But the family's property assets clearly aren't such a point of contention. Gina's $25 million mansion on the Swan River, set in Perth's wealthy suburb of Dalkeith is pretty hard to miss. It is owned by a holding company, Riverview Flats Pty Ltd.

John Hancock and Gina Rinehart ... taking the old cliché of neighbourly tension to a whole new plane. Philip Gostelow

But Riverview Flats also owns the lot next door. And you wouldn't guess who lives there: John Hancock. Yes, the estranged son is also the next door neighbour. Bizarre, right?

It's understood Hancock is entitled to rent the cottage from his mother's business as part of one of several deeds the two have previously entered into. Entitled is one thing, but ballsy is another! We wonder if they both keep a flamethrower by the front door.

It sure takes the old cliché of neighbourly tension to a whole new plane. Only in Perth…