A four-bedroom home on Rotorua’s Lake Rotoiti sold at auction Tuesday for $4.8 million.
And while the price on the 1970s architect-designed home on Whangamoa Drive, on a 1540sqm site overlooking Te Ti Bay, doesn’t match the lake record set at the beginning of the year of $5.7m, the agent for the sale, Bayleys Rotorua manager Beth Millard said it was an “extraordinary result”.
“It was a good price. You don’t know until the day of the auction – we knew who was coming, but you never know exactly who will bid,” said Millard, who marketed the property with Jacquie Bishop and Rebecca McMaster. Bidding reached $4.2m before some 20 minutes of negotiation brought the price to $4.8m and it sold.
The property on a well-landscaped 1540sqm site had an RV of $1.36m, but Millard said that figure was completely irrelevant on Lake Rotoiti, especially for heirloom or iconic properties such as this one.
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The sale price included extensive chattels, including a 100-year-old wooden boat, Kotuku, which is, the agents said, “a legend on the lake”.
The architect-designed house on Whangamoa Drive, Lake Rotoiti, Rotorua came with a 100-year old boat the Kotuku, which is legendary on the lake. Photo / Supplied
The Whangamoa Drive house had been extensively refurbished, with outdoor kitchen and fireplace. Photo / Supplied
The house was designed in 1976 by well-known local architect John Leary, whose family is synonymous with Lake Rotoiti, the agents said. The vendors of nearly 20 years had extensively renovated the house and landscaped the grounds, adding a second living area, outdoor fireplace and decking, double glazing and a walking track down to Te Ti Bay.
While the agents could not reveal details of the buyers, they said the property was going to a multi-generational Auckland family with close connections to the lake.
“These are heirloom properties; they don’t come to the market often.
“It’s a great day for Lake Rotoiti, it shows people will still pay for these heirloom properties,” Millard said, adding a freehold property with legal drivable access to Te Ti Bay was one of the most highly sought after.
She said that while there was still big interest in such properties, this year most of the buyers were conditional, unlike last summer.
The record price on Lake Rotoiti was set last year when a renovated house Wharetoroa Drive, on the lake, sold for $5.7m. Photo / Supplied
“Last year they were cash buyers, that’s the difference. Now the buyers have tougher criteria, the banks are taking longer to approve or some people need to sell their family house so they can buy their permanent house on the lake,” she said.
There were still a few buyers around shopping with budgets of around $4m, but she said entry-level properties like the three-bedroom 1950s house at 527 State Highway 33, across the road from the boat ramp, could be had for $700,000.
On the water, a two-bedroom bach in original condition on a 1062sqm “lawn to lake” site with its own jetty, boatshed and slipway on 1481 State Highway 30 would be closer to $1.5m she said.
An entry-level property on the lake, such as this original bach on 527 State Highway 33, would fetch around $700,000. Photo / Supplied
Buyers would expect to pay around $1.5m for a bach on the water such as this one at 1481 State Highway 30. Photo / Supplied
In the same auction, a 976sqm bare site on the water deep enough for mooring bigger boats, went for $1.48m, well over its CV of $990,000. The vendors had demolished the old house and had plans to build, Millard said.
“They sold with a heavy heart. They’re migrating to Australia or they would never have sold in a million years.
“It’s only 45 minutes to The Mount, 20 minutes to Rotorua, and you’re in stumbling distance to the Okere Falls store.”
Records are likely to tumble, Millard expects, when another listing at 157–159 Okere Road, also at Okere Falls, sells for a likely price in the high $6m.
The 8021sqm property, in two titles, has two homes of a striking glass and stone design by Hulena Architects, a three-bedroom main house and a two-bedroom guest house, along with pool, tennis court, shed for the toys and a boatshed and jetty on the lake.
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