A local family has bought an original Victorian house in Glebe’s prestigious and highly coveted Toxteth Estate for $2,705,000.
Four parties, all locals, registered to bid on the dated three-bedroom house at 54 Toxteth Road, which had a price guide of $2.3 million and needed renovating.
It was one of 718 homes scheduled to go under the hammer in Sydney on Saturday.
BresicWhitney auctioneer Thomas McGlynn was met with silence for several minutes before bidding got under way with an opening offer of $2 million.
Every buyer ended up taking part in the auction, with bids rising in increments from $50,000 to $5000 towards the end.
It sold for $2,705,000 to a local homeowner, her brother and their mother, who bought it together as a family purchase. The reserve was $2.6 million, revised up from $2.5 million on the day.
Local buyer Kel Foster said they were “shell shocked” and “excited” to be the winning bidders.
“We love Glebe and we live in Glebe. We’re looking at my mum moving here, so it’s a really nice location, a lovely street, so we’re really happy,” Foster said. “There’s a lot of work to get done, but we’re ready for it.”
While she said they were not timing the market, she believed they got the home for a better price than they would have six months ago.
“It’s an empty-nest downsizing opportunity for my mum. A house like this only comes up every now and then. The current [market] situation probably didn’t have as much impact as it might of in a normal situation.”
BresicWhitney partner and selling agent Shannan Whitney said all four bidders had some sort of relationship with Toxteth Estate.
“That was the driver and trigger and the main pattern that came out of the sale,” Whitney said. “The Toxteth Estate is probably one of the prestigious and premium inner-city neighbourhoods.”
He said with properties at the upper end fetching about $12 million, this home’s price guide was a “very attractive” entry point.
“The conditions are very appealing and attractive for buyers – that creates opportunities that may not have been possible two years ago.”
The result was well above the $13,000 that the home last traded for in 1970, and topped Glebe’s median house price of $2,326,000, on Domain data.
In East Killara, a five-bedroom house at 113 Springdale Road sold for $5.32 million.
A dozen buyers registered to bid on the home, which had a guide of $4.5 million.
Auctioneer Clarence White of Menck White Auctioneers said it took about 35 minutes to sell under the hammer, with five of the bidders competing.
“The increments were good, but the pace was slow,” White said.
“That [result] is the exception and not the rule in terms of what we’re seeing at the moment. That auction was something we would have seen six months ago.”
He said buyers were cautious and circumspect about bidding as they anticipated prices to fall further in the months ahead. White declined to reveal the reserve.
The property sold through William Chan of Marshall, Chan, Yahl North Shore, who also declined to disclose the reserve.
The home last traded for $801,000 in 2000, records show. East Killara’s median house price is $3.3 million.
In Gordon, a four-bedroom house at 10 McIntosh Street sold for $4.41 million to a family upgrading within the north shore.
Ten buyers registered to bid on the home, which had a guide of $3.5 million.
While bidding opened below that, at $3.1 million, it surpassed the guide and the reserve of $3.6 million, as four of the bidders competed.
Selling agent Jing Peng of LJ Hooker Gordon said people were willing to participate once they saw competition.
“I can see they are nervous about the market response to interest rates, but they still bid up to $4.41 million …people are still willing to pay the value.”
The property last traded for $1,315,000 in 2010, records show.
Gordon’s median house price rose 24.1 per cent to $3,165,000 in the year to March 2022.