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A five-bedroom beachside property in Clovelly sold for $6.77 million at auction on Saturday, with four bidders pushing the price $220,000 above the reserve.
The family home at 16 Northumberland Street had four bedrooms on one level and a self-contained apartment underneath for guests or rental income.
Four bidders registered, and all four competed for the coastal opportunity. Three were from the eastern suburbs, the other from the inner west, and all were potential owner-occupiers.
Bidding opened at $6 million, before a small crowd in the backyard, and rose slowly in $50,000, $20,000 and $10,000 increments for the beachside house with ocean views.
More than 25 minutes passed before it sold under the hammer for $6.77 million, clearing its $6.15 million guide and $6.55 million reserve.
There is no legal requirement for a vendor’s reserve to be in line with their property’s price guide.
Selling agent Alexander Phillips, of PPD Real Estate, said: “It was a really competitive auction.”
“Amazing position, 200 metres to the beach, great house with good potential,” he said.
The property was one of 1030 scheduled auctions in Sydney last week.
By Saturday evening, Domain Group had recorded a preliminary auction clearance rate of 55 per cent from 583 reported results, while 187 auctions were withdrawn. Withdrawn auctions are counted as unsold properties when calculating the clearance rate.
Phillips also had an oceanfront auction at Tamarama at 5 Kenneth Street, which passed in on a vendor bid of $21.5 million, $3.5 million below its $24 million reserve.
When the home hit the market last spring its price guide was $30 million. The vendor is Peter Metzner, owner of events and fashion PR firm The ARC Factory.
The later $19 million price guide was updated once more, to $20 million, before auction.
Phillips expects the property to sell in coming days. The three existing units at the address have been approved for redevelopment into two luxury units.
In Annandale, a terrace with an ideal work-from-home setup sold for $3,122,000.
The two-storey home at 92 Nelson Street has three bedrooms upstairs, with a separate ground-floor entrance to an office, extending to an outdoor courtyard and garden.
The original $2.5 million guide rose after feedback to $2.6 million, with buyers told “high 2s” following a pre-auction offer of $2,825,000.
Eight upsizing locals registered to bid on the inner west home with period features. Six made offers, with most bidders families and a few young couples.
Bidding opened at $2.4 million and moved quickly, with $50,000 increments initially, then $20,000 and $5000 rises as it soared past its $2.8 million reserve.
Within five minutes, the price reached $3,122,000, selling under the hammer before a large crowd on the street.
Selling agent Rhonda Yim, of BresicWhitney Inner West, said: “This one, I think, kind of bucked the trend in the current market with multiple registrations and very competitive bidding, which was a nice change.”
“Annandale is always a popular suburb, and I think the proximity to the city and the village is really appealing,” she said.
Yim said the underbidder saw the terrace for the first time only on the day of the auction, joining late and missing out by just $2000.
The buyer is upsizing within the suburb, while the vendor is downsizing locally.
In Sefton, a four-bedroom weatherboard home at 8 Wallace Street sold for $1.25 million, $40,000 below its $1.29 million reserve.
Selling agent Jordon Le Breux, of Ray White Bankstown, said that the auction was “a bit like pulling teeth, to be honest”.
Le Breux didn’t use a guide but provided an estimated selling price of $1.25 million to $1.3 million.
Bidding opened at $1.1 million, and two of the three registered buyers went back and forth in $1000 and $5000 bids until it sold to a buyer originally from Melbourne, living in nearby Chester Hill.
“It stalled a little bit, but we got it across the line, which is good,” he said.
Le Breux said most of those who inspected the property were first-home buyers.
“I was surprised we didn’t have any investors because this was kind of your perfect property … close to the station … to put a granny flat,” he said.
AMP chief economist Dr Shane Oliver said that Domain’s clearance rate of 55 per cent for Sydney was “fairly soft”.
“We’re not seeing any improvement,” he said. “It does seem to be stabilising around the mid-50s, but it’s well below normal levels for this time of year.
“I think it’s just a sign that demand remains depressed by the interest rate hikes, with the prospect of more to come.”
He pointed to uncertainty around the war in Iran and potential changes to capital gains tax and negative gearing in Tuesday’s budget as other major factors.
“All of those things are keeping some buyers sidelined, and that’s keeping the clearance rate relatively depressed.”
