auction clearance rates, page-5

The auction results from APM now show the number of expected auctions in the header. It's usually almost twice the number of reported auctions.

This is surprising to me actually that they decided to start doing this, as the implications are that the clearance rates of recent times around 80% for sydney, are actually a lot less.

I would say half, at say 40%, but I have been to auctions that have resulted in a sale, yet they dont appear in the results. It's just the agent being lazy I suspect in those cases.

The majority however I believe will be withdrawn due to lack of interest, passed in properties and no-bids.

I get the e-mail from RP Data as I have a login through work, they sometimes send out offers of ipads etc to entice the agents to report their results.

Regarding the underquoting for auctioned properties, just get used to that. Fair trading allows the agent to underquote their appraisal price for a pre-auction price guide by 10%. In a good vendors market, the agent will underquote the vendor by about another 10% to help the vendor to decide to sell when the appraisal price is easily met or exceeded.

So in this market in sydney for auctions in my experience, take the pre-auction price guide when first published, and add 20% (15% to 30% range usually) and that is often the price it will go for unless the property is crap in some or several ways.

After publication of the price guide, if the agent receives an offer above the guide price, they have to raise that guide price by fair trading rules. They are not allowed to disclose that offer price in exact numbers however.

I have seen many properties on the north shore, and out to ryde recently blow the original guide by 30%. The crime is, a lot of frustrated buyers are blowing large amounts of cash on legals and building and pest, thinking they can buy the property for something near the guide price. In some cases they can but this seems to be the exception rather than the rule. This could all change rapidly of course, as budget cuts and job losses could really take the steam out of this market.