July 13, 2003 - The Auction at <edited under threat of legal action>

Lang and I recently attended our first real estate auction. The outcome wasn't encouraging. The house in question is a <edited under threat of legal action>. It is badly fire damaged, and has been vacant since we moved into the area 16 months ago. We first came to know of the property a year or so ago when we were exploring the local bush tracks. We saw this enormous, <edited under threat of legal action>, soot-blackened house, and asked one of the neighbours what its story was. He told us that <edited under threat of legal action>. The house was <edited under threat of legal action>, and the <edited under threat of legal action>. The neighbour was grumbling about the state of the property, and the fact that the lawn was never mowed.

We walked past the house often, and visited it on a few occasions to collect lemons from the garden. Abandoned trees and abandoned houses don't share much in common. The house was slowly falling apart, while the lemon tree was growing more abundant. Our lemon raids, however, were abruptly halted by the erection of a security fence a few months ago.

Then, several weeks ago we noticed a For Sale sign go up. The house would be auctioned on site, on <edited under threat of legal action>.

The next time we walked past the house,


<edited under threat of legal action>


We inquired further about the property, and were advised that the house was expected to go for roughly land value only, and that no inspections would be allowed prior to the auction. Presumably inspections had been forbidden due to the high risk of having potential buyers fall through the burnt-out floors, or shred themselves on the broken windows.

Auction day rolled around, and the normally quiet <edited under threat of legal action> street started filling with Mercs and Porsches, as well as the obligatory 4WDs, and builders' utes emblazoned with business names.

Before the auction started, the auctioneer pointed out that the house in question enjoys a great north-easterly aspect. He obviously didn't have his compass with him.

The first bid was $300,000. The second was $400,000. Shortly after that,


<edited under threat of legal action>


But given the real estate agent's earlier comment about the house's north-easterly aspect, I for one didn't feel re-assured by this placatory comment.


<edited under threat of legal action>

Still, the bidding continued. And the question I have is this - What is a very steep, west-facing, 1000m² block of land in Castle Hill worth these days? Hopefully not more than $700,000, which is what the bidding stopped at yesterday. Going on for three-quarters of a million dollars for a house that the buyer was not even allowed to inspect prior to purchasing.

I am under the distinct impression that our society is becoming more ruthless when it comes to the holy dollar. The lesson I am learning is that there will always be someone with more money and looser morals than you. There's no point taking notice of <edited under threat of legal action>, because you can be sure that nobody else cares about <edited under threat of legal action>. There's certainly no point in looking for a real estate bargain anywhere in greater Sydney anymore, because the guy next to you (the one with more money than you) will make damn sure that you don't get your bargain. He makes it his business to prevent a bargain from happening by counter-bidding until the final price doesn't bear any resemblance to value-for-money any more. So we (lowly, prospective first-home buyers) keep moving north and west until we can out-bid somebody, and the ruthlessness spreads.

POST SCRIPT - A couple of weeks after the auction happened, the most crass piece of real estate marketing material that I have ever laid eyes on landed in our letterbox.

The A4 page showed a large (but crap quality) picture of the burnt out house, with a heading declaring "$221,000 OVER RESERVE!!". Below the picture of the damaged house was a picture of the agent - a Mr Cheeseman - who was literally jumping for joy.

Go ahead and click on the thumbnail (right) for an enlarged view.

POST POST SCRIPT - I moved away from Castle Hill in mid-2004, but in response to my post about the auction of <edited under threat of legal action>, I received these emails in 2006:

On 15/04/2006, Darren wrote:

"<edited under threat of legal action> is up for auction again. Looks like the winner in 03 couldn't afford it and the banks are closing in again. I cant believe someone paid 7XXK for it as a wreck.
We are kinda interested in it this time round but don't think it's worth as much as it got last time....."

And on 30/04/2006, Darren wrote:

"The house sold for $8XX,000. Again about 200 more than it was worth."