Auction Rates Plummet To Normal Levels

ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact

People are not buying and selling houses at the same rate as they did this time last year and that is bad, according to the nation's largest media publishers.

In parts of NSW and Victoria, only 40pc of houses are being sold when the go to auction each weekend and that is putting the fear of God into the real estate industry which has scaled itself up to an unsustainable level in recent boom years.

Most noise is coming from Nine Entertainment Co's newspapers, as they're essentially worthless without Domain propping them up. Same can be said for News Corp and their realestate.com.au juggernaut that's helping offset losses at The Australian and every other major daily except for the Courier-Mail, which is actually not a bad paper by comparison.

Local man Dane Carpenter has been looking for an apartment in Betoota Heights near the train station and has welcomed the new normal of being harangued by desperate bottom-tier real estate agents night and day.

"Look, it's not actually too bad when you've got the right amount of apartments for the right amount people looking to buy one," he said.

"I'm able to pick one I want to live in, instead of just buying one because I have to. It's pretty good. Been to a few auctions and the agent's said we're starting at $500,000 and people have genuinely laughed at loud hearing that. It's refreshing. About half of the bidders left and said they'll be back next week when the vendor's done pulling himself in the mirror,"

"Then there's the agent calling me up at 7pm on a Tuesday night saying he'd do anything but sell his arse to get me to buy his listing. You know, you just low ball them, it's fucking awesome how everything's changed. What people don't tell you is, when you're bidding against property investors right, you're paying for their tax concessions right? That's what you're bidding against so you remove them, you're up against no-hoper apartment owners like yourself and it's just a battle of who wants to live in this worthless shithole on the third floor of 35 more. And that's the way it should be."

The Advocate reached out to several real estate agents for comment but none where interested unless we agreed to buy any of their lisitings.

More to come.