Renovated Port Melbourne house sells for less than five years ago after passing in at auction

A glamorous house in Port Melbourne passed in at auction on Saturday and sold afterwards for $1,975,000 to the only genuine bidder, less than its last sale price.

The architecturally designed three-bedroom Victorian at 275 Princes Street features a striking courtyard with a climbing green wall, corner stacking sliding doors and stone benches in the kitchen.

The Port Melbourne home last sold for $2.13 million in 2021, records show.

The property was one of 654 scheduled to go to auction in Melbourne last week. By Saturday evening, Domain recorded a preliminary auction clearance rate of 59 per cent from 481 reported results throughout the week, while 82 auctions were withdrawn. Withdrawn auctions are counted as unsold properties when calculating the clearance rate.

Last month, it was listed with a price guide of $1.8 million to $1.9 million and 100 groups inspected the home during the campaign.

At auction, the property received a genuine bid of $1.87 million, but with no further offers, the home passed in and negotiations commenced.

It sold after auction for $1,975,000, the reserve price, to buyers downsizing from the eastern suburbs. The sellers are moving closer to family.

There is no legal requirement for a vendor’s reserve to be in line with their property’s price guide.

“It was a stunning property. People really liked it,” Jellis Craig Port Phillip selling agent Max Mercuri said.

“It was a new build seven years ago, turnkey,” he added, saying current building costs are making finished properties attractive.

Speaking broadly about the market, he noted buyer caution but thought there was a shift in the air recently.

“Buyers are a little bit more cautious at the moment. In the last two or three weeks I have seen a big shift in terms of buyers coming through open homes,” he said.

“There is a shortage of good quality homes and there is still demand… There is a little bit more confidence coming back into the market.”

Elsewhere, in Essendon, a bidding war pushed the price of a three-bedroom home to $300,000 over the reserve, and it sold for $1.4 million.

Three bidders competed for 1/5 Balmoral Street, which was one of two houses on its block. Its price guide was $1 million to $1.1 million.

A vendor bid of $1 million kicked off proceedings, and the price then rose largely in $20,000 increments, passing the reserve of $1.1 million.

Two downsizers fought hard, but the winner was a man who owned the unit at the rear of the block – where his parents live, but he does not.

“It was really kind of unicorn stock,” Frank Dowling selling agent Joel Campbell said, noting the double garage, single-level home had no body corporate. “It is a unit that behaves like a little house.”

He said the buyer plans to rent the property out. “He has acquired both now for pretty much land value.”

The seller was also an investor.

In Melbourne’s west, a first home buyer family paid $702,000 for a family home with a backyard, covered outdoor area, garage and workshop.

The three-bedroom house at 13 Meager Street is set on a spacious block of 604 square metres. It had a price guide of $650,000 to $700,000.

Three bidders registered and two participated, starting with a bid of $650,000, the bottom of the price range.

The price then rose in a mix of $10,000 and $5000 increments until it reached $700,000. It was followed by an offer of $702,000, at which point the bidding halted.

Although the reserve was $720,000, the vendors reduced their reserve to put the house on the market, and it sold for the previous bid.

Ray White West Realty selling agent Darren Lambert said the home had sold by private sale a couple of times, but the deals fell over, prompting a switch to an auction campaign.

He said the vendors were also owner occupiers, but the underbidder was an investor.

He described the market as steady, albeit with homes spending a little longer on the market before selling compared to last year.

“Our main price point in the west, it has not affected us as much as those in the higher price points,” he said.

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Elizabeth Redman is the national property editor at The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via X or email.AdvertisementAdvertisement