…What to do when the two you like auction the same day?

A lovely client of ours enlisted our support to help her find her future home while she juggled the difficulty of balancing ever-changing night shifts at a busy south-eastern hospital. Her brief was simple; she hoped to find a well-lit, secure modern townhouse in a quiet street.

Often we assist overseas or interstate buyers who are unable to physically coordinate their search, but sometimes we help busy professionals who are time-poor and unable to meet the standard inspection times. Being full-time property searches ourselves we could sift and shortlist, and then readily work in with our client’s times to enable her to see our finds.

This search took us approximately two months and twenty-seven days from commencement to contract-signing.

Clients often ask us “how long does it normally take?” While there is no such thing as normal when it comes to property, we have found that over 90% of our clients’ briefs are successfully completed within a three week to three month period.

This particular assignment wasn’t devoid of challenge and disappointment. Our lovely client’s first winning selection was due to go to auction when she was overseas on a conference. We promptly organised payment terms, a signed bidding authority and agreed on the upper limit via gmail and Skype in between our clashing time zones.

Sadly we were the under-bidders on a beautiful subdivided Hampton East house back in October.

Some five weeks later we uncovered not one but two eligible properties which our client liked enough to pursue. Both were scheduled or a 5th December auction, but the one she favoured more was scheduled for mid-afternoon, while the less-preferred was due to go under the hammer at midday.

This stunning, double-storey gem in Montgomery St Bentleigh represented everything on the critieria list; light-filled, private, great orientation, superb living space, quality fit-out and secure block

Yet on the other hand, Whitmuir St Bentleigh’s single-level, quiet rear unit in a block of three was no consolation prize. It too was beautifully proportioned and in it’s own right would have fulfilled all of the criteria too.

So what do we do in situations like this?

Simple. We prioritise and then strategise to buy the favoured property prior to auction.

The agents on both properties were each so helpful. Transparency was the key for us. We explained to both agents what our dilemma was. By providing each with enough information to share the background with their vendor, we were able to successfully tempt the vendor on Montgomery to agree to sell prior or a fair and reasonable price, whilst giving them the certainty that we’d agree to face competing buyers if others were keen to purchase at that same level.

What we effectively did was move the auction date forward.

Whitmuir could have made our client quite happy, but her desire to prioritise Montgomery St meant that she didn’t risk losing TWO properties on Saturday 5th December. Had we faced auction in the opposite order of preference, she may have held back on bidding strongly for Whitmuir in the hope that she can later punt on Montgomery.

But nothing would be more devastating for a buyer than to shortlist two, and consecutively miss both on auction day for a price which could have been manageable.

We often deal with this type of dilemma; and strategic planning, great agent-dialogue and moving swiftly can change the order of the sales in our favour.

Photos sourced from REA