Rare post-war home sold for first time ever at mind-blowing price
A 1950s house has finally had its first ever sale at auction, with a big crowd the late vendor’s family shocked at how much it went for.
A post-war home built in the 1950s has sold for the first time ever on Saturday, with twenty members of the late vendor’s family there to part with the home.
The three-bedroom, one-bathroom property at 37 Zeehan St, Wavell Heights, drew a crowd of 75 people to watch the classical house finally go on sale, after only ever having one owner since it was built.
Bidding began at a flat $1 million dollars, with eight registered bidders having signed up for the auction.
Five of those bidders began to actively fight for the home, shooting up the price by hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Place Newmarket agent Ross Armstrong described the bidding as fast-paced, especially picking up when offers went as low as $500 at a time.
“It was a really competitive auction,” he said. “The first time the house had been sold; that’s pretty rare these days.”
“Someone who had withdrawn their interest returned at $1.52 million … there were three active bidders near the end.”
The returning bidder almost managed to get the property, but lost when the winner raised the offer by $1,000.
The home finally sold for $1.521 million: smashing the suburb median house price of $1,257,500.
Mr Armstrong said the original owner “raised a family” in the home he built, and remained there for decades after.
He added the remaining family members were “emotional, but they were very happy with the result”.
But the house itself likely won’t be staying. The winning bidders were a group of developers interested in knocking the house down, and building a new home atop the property.
Mr Armstrong said many of these investors and developers were relying on the market to shift to make their new builds viable, such as from market changes that would come with lower interest rates.
“The post-wars are very strong, there’s a lot of interest,” he said. “Probably more interest in knockdowns and rebuilds than the finished product … a lot of people buying these now are relying on a market shift.”
Originally published as Rare post-war home sold for first time ever at mind-blowing price