A four-bedroom house sold under the hammer this week for $540,000 – $200,000 less than what the buyer had paid for it two years ago
But the vendor was accepting of the result, said Harcourts agent Lara Mullane, who marketed the Windy Ridge Road property, in Glenfield, with Gee Doshi.
The agent said they’d been completely honest with their vendor, who had bought the house for $740,000 in June 2021 as the market was nearing its peak.
He bought the house, built in 1995, knowing it had not received its Code Compliance Certificate (the listing said that the builder had further work to complete). At the time the buyer hadn’t been bothered since he’d planned to remove the tired cedar house and rebuild his dream home.
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However, circumstances changed, Mullane said.
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“He’d never lived in the property. He’d got as far as a resource consent and having plans done for the new house for a family home.
“We knew that in this market, with no investors, it would achieve maybe $500,000 or $600,000. We were taking a massive punt. The vendor said, ‘I want to sell’ and we were very honest from the beginning.
“It was the hardest auction we’ve ever done. The vendor had his head in the right space.”
Buyers interested in the Windy Ridge Road property focused on the potential of its park-side location. Photo / Supplied
The property had a CV of $820,000 – $500,000 of that for the land. Mullane said 15 groups viewed the property, mostly builders who were cash buyers. They knew the street and could make estimates of what it would cost to rebuild the house, working from the council list of remediation.
“Even then, some said $180,000, $250,000, up to $300,000, that’s just walking through, before you open it up,” she said.
However, the house is right next to the popular Windy Ridge reserve, near the school and in a sought-after part of the suburb, so once completed would have good resale value.
Mullane said there was just one bidder at auction, but the agents didn’t know whether he planned to renovate the existing house or build new. Bidding paused at $500,000 and after negotiation the house was back on the market for $540,000 and the hammer came down.
“We had a lot of other conditional offers waiting,” said Mullane. “But nobody knew what the value was, we didn’t know.”
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