Hawthorn: 14 Lyndhurst Crescent: Bought $1,511,000. Bidderman 3. Peter Batrouney and Campbell Ward. Big crowds throughout Boroondara today - seemed the strongest area over $1million.

Strong day in Boroondara today for good properties, with many homes selling under the hammer and selling strongly. However not all auction results have been reported.

Some of the auctions that we attended -

8 Moorhouse Street Camberwell (Heather Elder, Marshall White). Sold for $1,997,000 – 4 bidders

14 Lyndhurst Crescent Hawthorn (Peter Batrouney, Jellis Craig). Sold for $1,511,000 – 3 bidders

Common to all of the properties today was their intrinsic quality. As James Tostevin remarked last week, if it isn’t a good property and the vendor’s expectations are not in line with market thoughts, then the property will struggle to sell (that is not rocket science except it hasn’t been that way since November 2009).  One property that really did surprise was  7 Carlyle Street Hawthorn East. This passed in without a bid and sold afterwards for $1,546,000. Great result here for Robert Ding of Jellis Craig.  This was a basic 60’s house with multi-level flats to the rear – next door was an older  period home (which needed work)  yet did not have the same privacy issues and sold for about the same money only a  few weeks ago through a different agency.

I guess the big observation is all about the properties that did not sell at a Saturday auction this week, because they were bought in the week before.

• 28 Coleridge Street Kew (Hamish Tostevin/James Tostevin, Marshall White),
• 14 Royal Crescent Camberwell (Peter Batrouney / Campbell Ward, Jellis Craig),
• 94 Argyle Road Kew (Stuart Evans / James Tostevin),
• 18 Callantina Road Hawthorn (Joanna Nairn / James Tostevin, Marshall White),
• and a quiet off-market property in Raheen Drive Kew (Scott Patterson, Jellis Craig).

All of these were solid properties and sold strongly for around the $3m mark. Obviously by this number the market (for quality homes) at this level remains strong.

Talking to Alastair Craig from Jellis Craig he believed that the clearance rate was around 85% for properties which his agency auctioned today – a big improvement on last week (around 70%).  Perhaps last week was just a blip – just like it was last year for the week after the Melbourne Cup weekend. Time will tell.

Couple of land values for the stats guys. Havelock Road Hawthorn East (Campbell Ward Jellis Craig) around $2000 sqm. Rubens Grove Canterbury (Tom Ryan of Jellis Craig) $2200 per sqm.

Following up a couple of recent pass-ins in that little fringe pocket of Hawthorn – near the river – south of the tram depot. 24 Elm St (Antony Woodley Marshall White) was bought for we believe a tad under $2 million and 21 Oak remains on the market.

Big  numbers for scheduled auctions for most Boroondara agencies next week – and there is fair bit else happening, namely the Grand Prix and the first round of AFL footy – lets see how the market performs  and next week go Doggies. (and Pies)

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