A last-minute intervention by the bank halted a $1 reserve auction of a plaster home in Auckland this week.
The owner of the three-bedroom rental property in Onehunga had wanted a quick sale in order to free up some equity and opted to sell with an ultra-low reserve to show how motivated he was.
Ray White listing agent Rubal Singh told OneRoof the vendor had already gone unconditional on a new home and needed the money from the sale of his investment property to help pay for it.
However, two days before the auction, the vendor received a phone call from his bank instructing him to ditch his original plan and set the reserve much higher.
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Singh quickly put out word that the plaster home would no longer be sold with a $1 reserve. Interest plunged as a result, with the number of potential buyers dropping from 18 to five.
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The property at 11D Waitangi Road passed in at auction on Thursday after failing to meet the new reserve. Bidding kicked off at $100,000, and bunny hopped along until it hit the ceiling at $400,000.
Singh now has the house on the market with an asking price of $779,000 due to the financier's input.
Singh’s boss, Ray White Manukau co-owner Tom Rawson, said the seller had been keen to sell the property at auction, but the bank had different ideas.
The top bid was well below the property’s 2021 CV of $900,000 and the $520,000 the owner paid for it in 2014.
This is the second time 11D Waitangi Road has been put up for auction in the space of a year. Last July, the property failed to meet its reserve and was withdrawn from sale.
The three-bedroom, two-bathroom home had been rented out to the same tenants for the last eight years. Photo / Supplied
Singh told OneRoof last month that his vendor was also in the process of selling four more rental properties in his portfolio.
OneRoof reported last month that the vendor’s Clendon Park property was already under contract and that the other three were due to hit the market.
Singh said: “He has to sell all of them because he’s already gone unconditional on the property that he’s buying ... He already owns a home in Albany and he’s selling another one.”
Last month, a brave property owner sold a three-bedroom, one-bathroom home on Corsair Crescent in Mangere at a $1 reserve auction. The property sold in a fast-paced auction for $750,000, which was $25,000 more than an offer they turned down earlier this year.
Agents behind some of the $1 reserve auctions this year said the increase in these auctions was due to property owners attempting to make their properties stand out in a cluttered market.
- 11D Waitangi Road, in Onehunga, is now being sold with an asking price of $799,000
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