Zingless Spring, Hopeless Odds and Too Many Bridesmaids
Spring in Melbourne usually means racing, roses, and real estate records. But this year? The roses are blooming, the Cup is coming… and the Top End feels like it forgot to set the alarm. Sydney’s charging ahead while Melbourne stumbles at the gates. Agents are revving engines, vendors are setting reserves, but the buyers? Missing. The market’s awash with stock, but light on substance — and as ever, the odds favour those who price right and play smart.
One Notable Sale
Among the $1B+ in Top End listings, only one sale stands out: 42 St Georges Road @ $19.2m
The rest? Some we can’t even whisper (off-market) and a mini-throng still milling in the paddock.
A very lonely win in a field full of hopefuls.
The Spring Cup Field: Hopefuls vs Long Shots
- 2 Towers Road, Toorak – Listed at $60m+, the race favourite. But who’s got the ticket?
- 6 Heyington Place – Lining up, but limping.
- 6 St Georges Road – $45–50m? That’s not odds, that’s a dare.
- 29 Lansell Road – $31m+… it’s a big price for a place bet.
Try, Try, Try Again: The Serial Sellers
Some homes get more relaunches than a failed tech startup.
58 Hopetoun Road, Toorak – back again, looking for love.
Cue the sad violin?
Bridesmaids Row
- 38 & 38A Lansell Road – $80M+
- 62 Clendon Road – $90M
Lots of frocks yet none to be seen walking down the aisle. There’s hundreds of millions in these listings — and no one saying “I do.”
Underquoting’s Ugly Sibling
Agent promises the vendor the world. “$20m? W’ve got buyers lined up out the door.”
Underquoting gets the media coverage, over-promising does just as much damage
Talk to Sotheby’s Rob Curtain and hear about reality living at 30% below the promises. The key is pricing correctly and bringing qualified buyers to the table.. “It’s about transparent pricing and strategy. Not headlines.”
Overpromising Agents, Vanishing Listings
Some agents talk a big game, inflate prices, and lose the listing when reality kicks in.
See: 5 Tyalla Crescent, Toorak – proof that bluster without strategy is just noise.
Message to the new kids: Play with a straight bat. Fairytales don’t last long up here.
The Fall of Rome: Pinocchio’s Spring Sequel
Once an empire. Now a ruin. Can’t sell. Can’t buy. Can’t manage. Can’t be taken seriously.
Rome remembers. So does Toorak.
Down the Coast: Fields of Dreams… and For Sale Signs
The Peninsula’s packed with paddocks, but interest is wilting. The Collins Street Farmer? Extinct.
Land tax + buyer fatigue = a one-horse race.
Covid Coastal Regrets
Sea-changers are quietly wishing they hadn’t. The pandemic is over, but the properties are still sitting. What was a frenzy now feels like a hangover.
Odds-On Favourites… with No Field
This Spring, it’s not five or six bidders racing to the finish.
It’s one. Maybe.
If they turn up.
And, as Always… Underquoting Rides Again
Like clockwork, the quotes creep up and the truth vanishes.
Example?
13 Allenby Ave, Camberwell
- Start: $6.75–7.25M
- Quote creep: to $7–7.5M
- Final quote: $7.75M
- Sale: $8.65M+
It’s systematic. It’s strategic and it’s still being allowed to happen. Underquoting isn’t cheeky — it’s cheating.