$1 reserve house is the worst agent has ever seen

A two-bedroom house in South Auckland, the worst the agent says he’s ever seen, is being auctioned next week with a $1 reserve.

It joins a slew of properties in the last 15 months where owners have taken the risk of setting a low – or no – reserve in order to entice more bidders to the auction.

“It’s to show that the vendors are super-motivated, they need as much cash as they can get,” said Tasreet Dhatt, the Harcourts agent who is marketing the property at 4/60 Moncrieff Avenue, in Manukau’s Clendon Park.

“They will be super-grateful for whatever they can get on the day.

“They’ve had it for so long, it’s fully paid off so even a dollar is profit in their eyes. Any money they get goes straight in their pocket.”

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He said the owners bought the 1970s cross-lease place 17 years ago for $155,000 as their first home, living in it until 10 years ago when they bought another house up the road. The home had been rented for a few years, but has sat unoccupied for the last two years, gradually filling up with the owners’ possessions.

OneRoof records show the property had been listed in late 2022 asking for enquiries over $399,000, but had failed to find a buyer.

The owners of 17 years of the Moncrieff Avenue house are now using it to store their stuff. Photo / Supplied

Renovations appear to have started in the bathroom. Photo / Supplied

Records show it has a CV of $540,000, but Dhatt said that places in the neighbourhood selling for that sort of money, the mid to high $500,000s, would be in good liveable condition.

This is not.

Photos of the listing show holes in the ceiling, a semi-completed bathroom and kitchen with cabinets missing and raw flooring. Several of the rooms have parts of the ceiling missing or patched, while a rear carport is piled with old tyres, a van and trailer, and junk.

The agent said that in the 15 years he’s spent renovating properties with his father, this was the most run-down place he’d seen.

Dhatt said the strategy of letting the market know the home could sell for as little as $1 has paid off, with over 50 buyers enquiring about the place, 30 of them looking in person and, five days out from the auction. So far twenty have registered as bidders – numbers he calls “crazy” in an otherwise slow market. The potential buyers are mostly flippers and traders looking for a do-up project, although he said a couple of first home buyers have also looked.

Some of them he has seen frequently in the market, while some are new flippers or investors “coming out of the woodwork”.

He said some were flippers who had turned to developing in the peak of the market, but were now coming back to their bread and butter.

The unfinished kitchen and living room. Photo / Supplied

“They were buying the 800sqm site and putting four or five or six townhouses on. What we’re seeing is that the new-build market has slowed down a little bit, so those people have kind of come back to renovations, where they started.

“There are a lot more opportunities in that area than there are in development at the moment.”

Dhatt said that while the house’s exterior siding and roof appear to be in good condition, renovators would have to strip the interior to the studs, putting in new flooring, gib board, kitchen and bathroom.

“I’ve had people quoting $70,000 to $120,000 or $130,000 [work], it really depends how people are sitting and how well of a job they want to do,” he said, adding that demand was high if they could resell the made-good house for the mid-$500,000s.

He said his motivated $1 reserve sellers were standing out in a market that was currently flooded with listings.

“I’m selling properties across all price ranges. What really matters is making sure that your property is priced to the market you’re selling in.

“We’ve got a lot of stock in the market that is quite overpriced and a lot of people expecting magic to happen.”

Last week, an even bolder strategy, a no-reserve auction, paid off for the owner of a smart brick and tile house in Carisbrook Crescent, Papakura, when it sold for $827,000 under the hammer. Again, the vendor wanted to send a clear message he was prepared to sell, and was over the moon at the price, just $23,000 short of the property’s $850,000 CV.

The quality of that property meant the buyers were a young family, rather than flippers looking for a bargain buy to add value to.

But the sellers of a two-bedroom apartment above the shops on Quay Street in Auckland city centre were less lucky when their $1 reserve property sold for just $62,000 this week.

OneRoof records show the property had last changed hands at the end of 2005 for $182,000 and had a CV of $730,000. OneRoof records show a similar apartment in the block sold for $88,000 a year ago.

The 90sqm apartment with one car park was marketed by Ray White agents Grant Elliott and Daniel Boderick as a short sale auction, with just nine days from the property going on the market to the auction. The agents said the tired leasehold property was currently rented for $630 a week, but with a spruce up could fetch as much as $750 to $800 a week.

The agent’s enticing copy drew in eight bidders: “You could buy this two-bedroom cash cow on your credit card.

“What’s the catch? You won’t have time to talk to the bank. The auction’s next week. But you’ll need a little bit of cash and the ability to put your hand high,” they said.

- 4/60 Moncrieff Avenue, Clendon Park, Manukau goes to auction March 19