A modest bungalow near the beach in Auckland’s Point Chevalier sold sight unseen last week for $2.7 million – within two days of hitting the market.
Professionals agent Derek von Sturmer said the buyers made an unconditional cash offer on Friday night but didn’t set foot in the three-bedroom Joan Street property until Sunday.
“They didn’t look at it until after they bought it. They took the gamble that the house was suitable,” he told OneRoof.
“They paid $2.7m. That was the upper end of my appraisal.”
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The house has a CV of $3m and last changed hands in 2019 for $1.9m, according to OneRoof records.
Von Sturmer said the buyers had been looking for something in the suburb for six months. “They liked the location, the beach, and the lifestyle.”
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He said they planned to renovate the bungalow and carve off the back of the 597sqm section to build a new house.
Von Sturmer said the speed of the sale was a wake-up call for buyers. “I don’t think people believed me when I said there were other people interested. People always think the real estate agent is bluffing a bit or the market is not that great,” he said.
“If you’re trying to time the bottom of the market, you might have missed it.”
He said the two most sought-after types of properties in Point Chevalier were three-bedroom houses on a half site looking for between $1.5m and $2m and four-bedroom bungalows at the $2.5m to $3.2m price point.
A house on Harbour View Road, in Point Chevalier, sold within two weeks. It had an asking price of $1.839m. Photo / Supplied
Developers recently paid $2.07m for a site on Smale Street, Point Chevalier. The property last changed hands in February for $1.795m. Photo / Supplied
The agent sold a bungalow on Huia Road on a half site for $1.755m in August, while another on Harbour View Road sold after just two weeks on the market (the price is not disclosed, but it had been asking $1.839m). Places around the $1.5m mark have been flying out the door at auction and von Sturmer estimated he had 30 buyers on his books looking for something.
He added that developers were making a return to the suburb, spotting that land values had come down from their peak. Some of them had come from pricier Westmere and Herne Bay and saw the opportunity of doing high-spec homes in Point Chevalier.
“They see a gap in the market. High-end sales are holding their value,” he said, citing the recent $2.07m sale of a development site on Smale Street, which was $275,000 more than what the vendors had paid in February.
“We are now getting inundated with calls from developers desperately looking for land.”
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