The Sydney building industry is mourning a construction entrepreneur and father of three young children, whose sudden death this week comes two years after he sold his stake in the company he founded to a private equity firm.

Troy Mayne, the co-founder and managing director of Modus Projects, is believed to have died at his waterfront property in Cronulla, in Sydney’s south, on Wednesday.

He was days away from his 47th birthday.

NSW Police declined to make a statement.

As an industry leader, the Mail understands that colleagues, Sutherland Shire locals and key figures in the city’s construction business are reeling at news of his passing.

Mayne co-founded Modus Projects, described as Australia’s top provider of facilities maintenance services, construction, project management and fit-outs, with his business partner Brad Berryman in 2010.

According to a late-2023 report in the Australian Financial Review, Modus Projects worked with a range of major businesses.

By the time Mayne sold his majority stake to CPE Capital in 2024, the company had 11 branches nationwide and was raking in $150million per year.

Following the sale, Mayne stayed on as managing director.

In June 2022, the Cronulla home he shared with his wife Laura, along with their son and two daughters, was featured in Vogue Australia.

The couple bought the beachfront property for $5.3million in 2015 and transformed the existing four-bedroom house – a former 1930s holiday cottage – into a modern two-storey home with polished concrete open plan living areas and a poolside bar.

Designed by architecture firm Akin Atelier, the Vogue profile highlighted the inspiration from Northern Beaches Merivale restaurant Bert’s, a favourite of Mayne’s.

According to Akin founder Kelvin Ho, Mayne ‘was really invested from a design point of view’.

His background in construction gave him a deeper understanding of the fundamentals of the project, added Ho.

Mayne met wife Laura, who is originally from Spain, during a surfing trip in the south of France. He bought her and her friends Solero ice cream as an ice-breaker.

She moved to Australia in 2007 and they married in 2012.