THE BIDDING was brisk at the Allsop Space auction of mostly distressed property in Dublin’s Shelbourne Hotel yesterday, as 1,600 people packed into the auction room and spilled out into the bar and lobby of the hotel.
A total of 97 of the 108 properties sold under the hammer with a further two selling after auction, raising a total of €11.4 million. Around half were cash buyers – 30 per cent less than at previous auctions.
A small group of protesters from a group calling themselves the Anti-Eviction Taskforce held a low-key protest outside the hotel. However proceedings came to a brief halt when one protester stood up in front of the auctioneer and warned about the “ill will” that could affect buyers of distressed property in communities.
“Don’t bid then,” replied auctioneer Gary Murphy from UK-based Allsop, before thanking the protestor for his “kind words”.
Around a third of the lots are apartments, and one of the bargains of the auction was a four-bed apartment in Northwood, Santry which sold for €76,000 – €16,000 over its reserve.
A first floor two-bed apartment at The Cubes in Beacon South Quarter, Sandyford, D18, with parking, sold for €152,000.
A good bargain for someone in the room but not such good news for Jim Kelly who was waiting for the lot to come up. His daughter bought a similar apartment in Beacon South Quarter four years ago for €420,000. “She told me not to tell her what it got,” he said.
There are some big properties with low reserves to whet buyer appetite including a double-fronted period house at 13 Garville Road, Rathgar, Dublin 6 with a reserve of €420,000 – the most expensive house of the auction – which sold for €435,000 – and 28 Grove Park in Rathmines, also in Dublin 6 which sold for bang on the reserve price €380,000. Both were leasehold properties divided into flats. A two-bed apartment at Adelaide Square, Dublin 8 with a reserve of €145,00 sold for €201,000 and a mid-terrace three storey over basement house on the North Circular Road, Dublin 7 went for €277,000 – €72,000 over the catalogue price.
A former nursing home in Rathfarnham on 1.64 acres with planning permission for 32 townhouses with a reserve of €400,000 attracted a lot of bidders and went for €580,000.
“The bidding was very business-like, there was no waiting around,” says Robert Hoban, director of auctions at Space Allsop. “A lot were there to bid, there weren’t as many onlookers as before.” For those that failed to sell, “it was simply because they were priced too high”.
Commercial properties included 174 Pembroke Road, Dublin 4, a freehold mid-terrace building arranged in two restaurants, which sold for €630,000 – the most expensive lot in the auction overall . The smallest lot was a 0.5-acre landholding in Ennis, Co Clare, which sold after auction for €11,000.
In Donegal, five four-bed houses in Beechwood Park in Convoy had reserves of €21,000 each – the cheapest homes going under the hammer but actually sold for between €32,000 and €53,000. A lakeside log cabin-style house on the shores of Lough Sillan in Shercock, Co Cavan, with access to a private marina, went for €131,000 – over four times its reserve.
The next Allsop Space auction will be held on March 1, 2012.
