The Macgregor auction

The Bond Certificate had arrived in the mail the day before.

We were both up bright and early. This was the property we couldn’t bid on because we didn’t get the deposit for our Warrandyte property. But we did bid at the auction. Not because the agent selling this property was going to do anything special for us, like make the sale of our Warrandyte property a condition of purchase. A last reassuring phone call to our agent in Melbourne returned the message that he had good faith in the honesty of our buyer, and the fact that the contract had been signed; despite the fact we were let down rather badly in the deposit part of the deal.

We had arrived early, and were one of the first on the property. It gave us time to wander around the house and yard. I found more things wrong with this property as we were walking around. There were some nasty holes and other damages, and a major structural beam was very badly warped. It looked unsightly even if it happened to be sound, but how do you know, and I don't recall it being mentioned in the building report. There was a general roughness about the place, particularly in the kitchen. The noise from the roadway was also much louder than expected. No doubt from the increased Saturday morning traffic that I hadn’t noticed during the week.

We registered to bid, and went outside to wait. We lingered in the courtyard between the two wings of the building, eventually sitting on the grass in a corner of the garden. I think our sitting on the ground might have confused the auctioneer’s assistants; they like to badger bidders before and during the auction. It’s harassment. We were immune from that, as they probably didn't want to scuff their shoes or crease their suits by bending down to talk to us.

S wanted to bid for the place. I suggested $375,000 be our maximum offer. I found out after the auction that S had $380,000 as her guide as a maximum bid. I also suggested she not open the bidding, but if she did, suggested opening at $300,000. I took a note of the bidding, and this is how it went:

S: $330
other person: $340
S: $350
other person: $355
S: $360
other person: $365
S: $366
other person: $367
S: $368
other person: $369
S: $370
other person: $371
S: $372
other person: $373
S: $374
other person: $375
S: $376
other person: $377
S: $378
other person: $380
S: $381
other person: $382
S: $383
other person: $384
S: $385
other person: $385 and a half
S: $386
other person: $386 and a half

The auctioneer called for more bids, but we were done. So that was it. The other guy got it for $386,500.

The final bid seemed much too high. S crossed the yard to congratulate the guy and shook his hand. He said, “Sorry.” Afterwards, we were both wondering if he would be feeling sorrier for himself than for us. S thought she had gone too high herself, and was carried away by the excitement of it.

S was wondering if the guy didn’t want to lose to a woman (S was the only other bidder). I had been wondering if he was showing off in front of his son. We both felt happy to have lost it at that price, and were wondering if it wasn’t such a bad thing that we’d failed to take the winning bid. There was a lot wrong with the place and the bidding did go rather high. I feel so glad he put in that last bid. Mind you, if he hadn’t shown up we might have got it for a lot less, as we would (likely) have been the only bidder. So we spent the rest of the day looking at other properties. But in the mean time we took a break in a coffee shop.

With a coffee in front of us, I was flicking through the real estate pages and spotted a property advertised for $340k to $360k. The ad in the newspaper had a very nice photograph of the place. So, I flicked the page around to S and asked what she thought of it. She liked it but thought it looked small. It had a Queensland, on stilts look, to it. S thought it had a bit of a colonial look to it. I rang the real estate agent, and arranged to see the place, which wasn’t as easy as I’d imagined.

The agent said the house had been advertised too early. She said the owners were finishing renovations, and weren’t allowing inspections until the following week. I had explained that S was in Canberra from Melbourne and would only have the weekend here. Anyway, an inspection was arranged. (It must be difficult for an agent to knock back punters.)

I also rang Manuel, another real estate agent who had a property for sale not far from the Macgregor auction. This property had been advertised for $325k. It was a 4br dump with a reasonable sized lounge, but most everything else was on the small side. This property was supposed to have sold last weekend, but there was trouble with finance, and the deal fell through. It was put back on the market, but missed getting into the newspaper. Manuel said it sold for the advertised price. He may have been fibbing. There would be a lot of renovating to do with this one, but it had potential. We were considering making an offer.