By Sarah Webb
A Hong Kong-based returning expat splashed $2,325,000 on a “1970s time capsule” home that looked as though it had been lifted from the set of The Castle at a Balwyn North auction on Saturday.
The four-bedroom, two-bathroom home at 20 Stroma Avenue had remained virtually untouched for half-a-century before being plated up to the market with a fresh coat of paint, new carpets and a reserve of $2 million.
The clever makeover, coupled with a block size of 708 square metres and a coveted location in the Balwyn High School zone, attracted a crowd of 80 people who were forced to pack into the old home as rain pelted down outside.
Bidding kicked off at $1.8 million, sparking a battle between seven punters, of which four were returning expats based in Hong Kong and Dubai.
Selling agent Scott Patterson, of Kay & Burton Boroondara, said a series of $20,000 bids brought the price to $1.9 million, the lower end of the advertised price guide.
A handful of $10,000 and then $5000 increments pushed the price to $2 million, the top of the guide and the reserve price.
After that, he said, a flurry of pint-sized bids as low as $1000 were thrown down until a Hong Kong-based woman – who is returning to Melbourne after about five years abroad – won the keys.
Patterson said the competition was unexpectedly fierce, and the home, a deceased estate that hadn’t changed hands in 50 years, was nothing short of a blast from the past.
“It was a time capsule from the ’70s with a pretty classic 1960s-style brick veneer facade and a pool … it all looked straight out of The Castle,” Patterson said.
“When we first went to inspect it, you had to get up from the lime-green couch to turn on the black-and-white TV.
The home had fresh coat of paint and carpets before auction.Credit: Kay & Burton
“Early on, we had to decide if it was worth spending $100,000 on the home to see if we could get another $200,000 or $300,000 … and in the end we did, and it proved to be worth the effort.
“The land value was circa $1.9 million, so the rest of that value was what people saw in the house.”
As well as repainting and re-carpeting the home, Patterson said they styled it. And while the old black-and-white “telly” was turfed, the home’s old oven, which no longer works, was kept.
“It shows the underlying strength of this area because of its proximity to schooling. It’s also about 10 kilometres from the CBD,” he said.
The auction was one of 989 scheduled in Melbourne on Saturday. By evening, Domain Group recorded a preliminary auction clearance rate of 65.4 per cent from 726 reported results, while 84 auctions were withdrawn. Withdrawn auctions are counted as unsold properties when calculating the clearance rate.
Over at 51 Joynt Street, Macleod, a renovated three-bedroom brick home on a 951-square-metre block in the sought-after Victoria Cross Estate sold for a reserve-busting $1,407,500 after seven bidders duelled it out for the keys.
The home was listed with an advertised reserve of $1,325,000, and bidding kicked off at $1.1 million, followed by a vendor bid of $1.2 million quickly after. A few $5000 bids were then thrown down to help the home reach the reserve.
Selling agent Nick Smith, of Nelson Alexander Ivanhoe, said it was then down to three main bidders, including a local who had waited until the eleventh hour to wade in, and a phone bidder from NSW who hadn’t seen the property.
“The buyer who got it was drawn in by the future potential of the home,” Smith said.
“The home itself was a drawcard, but then we also had buyers interested in knocking it down and rebuilding, alongside downsizing couples, younger couples and families.”
In Ascot Vale, an engineer from North Melbourne wandered into an auction in his footy shorts, on a whim. He then beat out the sole registered bidder to splash $1,091,000 on the run-down two-bedroom home on a 555-square-metre lot.
The cottage, which sits on Whiskey Hill at 2 Monash Street, hadn’t changed hands in 38 years.
Selling agent Jerome Feery, of Jellis Craig Kensington, said the one registered bidder kick-started the auction with a $900,000 bid. It then forced a vendor bid of $1 million to bring the home closer to its $1,055,000 reserve, with the North Melbourne buyer wading in soon after.
He said after a few more bids the auction was paused at $1,020,000 which kick-started a fresh flurry of small bids until it sold under the hammer.
Feery said the buyer planned to give the home a new lease on life.
Despite a series of top results clocked across the Victorian capital over the weekend, Ray White Chief Economist Nerida Conisbee said Melbourne remained the second-poorest performing capital city after Hobart.
“In a nutshell, it’s pretty weak and the view on the ground is that it’s a mixed bag,” she said.
“Typically, it’s the renovated homes that are selling well, but everything else is underperforming.
“This is really good news for buyers as it means a calmer market for people to get into, but the challenge will be there are a lot of homes coming to the market and a lot of these are from investors, and we do already have a lot of rental struggles.
“If you’re wanting to upgrade, however, it’s a good market.”
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