Saturday proved again that if you own something special, something a little unique or something that has WOW! you can get a great result even when it seems most of the market is drowning.
Hawthorn, for the second week in a row, was again the hot spot at the top end (is Toorak moving out?) with 45 Chrystobel Crescent selling in what may have been Melbourne?s first dining room auction: $8 million with three parties vying for the honour. It’s a substantial Victorian home on 20,000 square feet that needs a truckload of money spent on it.
And then there’s 15 Brook Street, Hawthorn; without doubt the biggest underquote of the year. 20,000 square feet in Hawthorn for $2.5 million plus? Really? The opening bid was $3,310,000 and three bidders pushed it to $3,811,000. Somebody needs to go back to school and work out land values.
Some areas bordering the better suburbs, such as Elwood and Glen Iris, also had some zing if it was good. In auctions we attended, all had multiple bidders with as many as eight for a weatherboard in Maitland Street, Glen Iris.
Toorak, again, had a sad day. While all results were not published, 4 Washington Street, a 12 year old 2-storey Wayne Gillespie pile had a single vendor bid of $4.4 million. Do the sums on land and replacement value, and you’ll see why that’s not adding up to a sale.
Given the coming long weekend and with school holidays on the radar, any vendor who hasn?t met the market by the end of this week faces the prospect of no sale for at least another month or so. Those with properties that are presently on the market are there for a reason. A few might have bought elsewhere and be in a hurry to sell, but the balance probably have other factors going against them; why else would you be trying to flog your biggest asset in the middle of the school holidays when a large part of the market is going north or to the snow?
Other than those few, it’s all very quiet. Few quality properties out there to buy (even off-market, which usually produces a range). The winter slowdown is here and we’re advising our clients to be patient.
But winter is also truffle season, so we’ll be digging a little deeper and, where we can, persuading some Spring vendors to move a little earlier.
Bayside. Now is the winter of our ? light show?
The bayside weekend? Just two downsides: a lack of decent offerings and lacklustre results for those properties which were put to the test. If it hadn’t been for those, it could have been great (as the agents will tell you).
With winter afoot, there is a distinct chill in the air as sellers struggle to accept the new reality: last year was then and this is now.
But even as the lights over auction signs are going out all over the suburb, there are agents who can see only the bright side: “Less stock in winter means prices must rise!”
Monty Python lives in Bayside!
Could someone tell the kid in the BMW that prices are falling because the buyers have left the building and that when the buyers left, so did the sellers. Got that?
So ?
Brighton’s results were boosted by four sales prior to auctions originally listed for the weekend; leading to a more respectable nine sales from the fourteen properties offered.
2-4 Sandown Street in the Golden Mile sold during the week – two weeks after auction – for $3.86 million. A potential development site with four brick maisonettes on 1064 sq m, it showed a return to the appointed administrators of $3628/sq m ($337/sq ft.)
A quiet private sale (so quiet it didn’t even make the internet) in Drake Street: $3,411,000
A well renovated seven room timber period residence on 743 sq m at 4 Bendigo Street, Hampton passed in on an astonishing vendor bid of $2.7 million against an even more astonishing reserve of $2.875 million; presumably including an oil well out the back.
The rest of Hampton had a cheerless day with only vendor bids taken for 1 Rouen Street (passed in at $1.35 million/reserve $1.55 million), 9 Storey Avenue (passed in at $1.36 million/reserve $1.475 million and 580 Hampton Street winning the big doughnut: a reserve of $1.075 million and not one bid.
Sandringham and Beaumaris each managed just one sale over $1 million:
4 Daly Road, Sandringham: $1.125 million
3 Harfleur Avenue, Beaumaris: $1.315 million
Even Bentleigh came back to the fold with only 6 sales from 13 offerings.
Next weekend is the opening of the ski season long weekend. Expect to see car parks full of discounted BMWs and slopes crowded with blue-suited desperates practising downhill moves.