A multi-million-dollar lifestyle property in north Auckland sold after just three days on the market, leaving behind a cluster of disappointed buyers.
Ray White agent Ross Hawkins, who marketed the brand-new house on Hibiscus Coast Highway between Waiwera and Hatfields Beach with Richard Bull, said that the house sold to the first person who came to look at it.
He could not reveal the price on the deal, but said it was between $4.5 million and $5m.
“It’s on a nice quiet road, breath-taking architecture with a four-bedroom home and a separate two-bedroom apartment. We sent it out to our clients on our database, and the first person who saw it wanted it.
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“We said ‘give us a show-stopping offer’ and he did. It was sold within three days of going online. We went ahead with the open home that Sunday and had a lot of disappointed people, all looking in that $4m-plus range.
“I just wish we had three more like it,” he said.
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Records show the land changed hands in March 2021 for $1.45m, with building consents for the 315sqm house issued in October that year. The home, with a gated entrance, had panoramic views across the water from its one-hectare hilltop terrace site and amenities included a swimming pool, lush, landscaped gardens and bush reserve and luxury finishes throughout.
Hawkins said that city buyers were looking for lifestyle property close to Auckland so less explored spots like Orewa and Waiwera, just 30 minutes out of the city, were ticking the boxes.
The brand-new house on Hibiscus Coast Highway between Waiwera and Hatfields Beach sold to the first person who came to look at it. Photo / Supplied
“They’re looking at lifestyle property, but don’t want to be two hours out of Auckland. We had more interest and more enquiry on this than anything we’ve had on the market, it was just a really nice package, close to all the beaches and handy to the city.”
The fast sale comes as Hawkins and Bull closed a record-breaking deal on Friday for a 1922sqm section and 320sqm house on the beach in Orewa, also on Hibiscus Coast Highway.
While he couldn’t disclose the exact price, Hawkins said it broke the previous record for the beach town, a deal he also brokered in November 2021 when a single buyer bought a pair of waterfront homes on separate titles for a total of $7.8m.
The highest settled sale price for a single listed home in Orewa in the last 12 months was $3.7m, in November, for a luxury home also on Hibiscus Coast Highway. On Red Beach, the next beach to Orewa, a 534sqm house on a 1019sqm section on Chelverton Terrace, sold for $9.25m in August 2021, OneRoof records show.
“The coastal and lifestyle market is alive and well, it seems the most buoyant segment, all across Auckland, particularly Orewa, Waiheke Island, Omaha,” Hawkins said.
"We’re seeing recent sales on Waiheke Island of front-row beach houses that have now surpassed the $10m barrier. If an unrenovated place on Orewa is now fetching nearly $8m, then up the coast we’d expect Omaha to do more like $10m in premium beachfront positions, especially in top areas like The Cove.”
An Orewa waterfront five-bedroom home, on the market for the first time in over 65 years, broke the $7.8m record set in 2021. Photo / Supplied
The five-bedroom 1970s Orewa home was on the market for the first time in over 65 years. Hawkins told OneRoof it was well-known to the beach community, located next to a reserve, with a famous “football field” street-facing yard. The property is zoned for single houses, meaning in theory buyers could put more than one house on the huge section, but it was families, not developers looking, he said.
“The house’s sale was the talk of the area. It was well-built, totally original, but would be really easy to do up. You could spend $1m to renovate and make something spectacular.
“We only showed it to qualified buyers, people who have a long-term view of the property, and were buying for their next generation.
“It’s just a beautiful big piece of land, that’s a land-bank – or you could put on a tennis court,” Hawkins said, adding that rock wall protection and sand replenishment by Auckland Council along this stretch of coast gave buyers comfort.
A waterfront home and boatshed on The Esplanade, Campbells Beach, is expected to fetch a record-breaking sum when it sells for the first time in almost 60 years. Photo / Supplied
“A new generation is seeing the potential of Orewa, it’s not the main road anymore and feels like a beach again. The village is getting an upgrade, you can sit on the deck of the surf club and eat your fish and chips – you're on holiday and it’s only 20 minutes out of the city.
On Auckland's East Coast Bays, Hawkins and Bull have just listed another property at 14 The Esplanade, Campbells Bay, which, again, has not been on the market in almost 60 years.
There are two houses on the property, an original 1960s five-bedroom house and a second 1980s one-bedroom boatshed behind it. The agents say it is the last remaining 1922sqm landholding on the beach and has “unrivalled redevelopment opportunity.”
The property has a CV of $8.95m, but Hawkins said the price “should be up there with the Waiheke and Omaha waterfront price levels also of circa $10m.”
- Click here to see more properties for sale in Orewa
