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26 Hopewell St, Paddington sold for $3.96 million — $300,000 more than it sold for seven months ago.
A PROMINENT architect has lashed out at the real estate industry saying designer homes are being undersold, after a house that he owns and his firm built sold for $300,000 more than he paid for it seven months ago.
The $3.96 million sale price for 26 Hopewell St, which was marketed through BresicWhitney’s William Phillips as an “architect’s reimagined terrace and studio”, left neighbours stunned. “The price is unbelievable for a terrace in Hopewell St, no matter who the architect was” one said, who’s thinking about putting his own home up for sale because of it.
And the architect, Alec Tzannes, who’d bought the three-bedroom house on a 155sq m block for $3.66 million through another agent last September said: “I feel that design matters more than is commonly understood by real estate and I think this is an exemplar of this.”
He and his wife, Margaret, had bought the house thinking they may move from their Surry Hills home, but instead “repaired a sliding door, replaced a blind, oiled the timbers and painted some bits and pieces” and put it up for auction in the challenged marketplace.
“We were made aware by BresicWhitney that the market had been softening, and even prices in other auctions and similar areas were not achieving their goals,” he said.
“But we felt the property would more likely hold its own and it turned out that it did.”
Although the previous marketing with the other agent clearly indicated that the house was “designed by Tzannes Associates and winner of a prestigious RAIA Architecture Award (2005) and a Commendation (2005)”, he felt that BresicWhitney did a better job of promoting that fact.
“It is certainly well designed and well built and I think that may not have been fully appreciated by the previous owner in the marketing campaign they ran,’ Mr Tzannes said.
Saturday’s sale price was also more than $1.3 million above the price achieved right next door for a three-bedroom renovated house — though not rebuilt and designed to the same level — just a month ago.
“And it’s very similar size, with a studio above the garage; it probably might have more original features but at the same time it’s been renovated pretty strongly,” he said.
“Design does matter, but it’s not easy to quantify.
“It’s certainly true that the metrics of a property — the land area, the size of the home and the number of bedrooms are easy to understand — but I think these sorts of things don’t take into account the quality of the design; quality of the construction and very sound features around sustainability.
“I’d like to think this is an eg of the marketing through BresicWhitney, of the market being made aware of the types of qualities a house has so that when buyers are looking they can see the difference.”
Mr Phillips had just two bidders register and bid for the house that Tzannes Architects designed and built in 2005.
The two men who bought it had been renting in Surry Hills, with the underbidders a Randwick family. It was the highest price in the east at Saturday’s auctions., although it was still under the $4 million reserve.
The highest price achieved at auction in Sydney was $5,715,000 for a six-bedroom house at 5 Firth St, Strathfield, via Robert Pignatoro and Vanessa Kim of Strathfield Partners.
They had eight registered bidders, although just two participated.
The buyer was a supplier of marble and granite, who apparently thought it was cheap!
He’d seen it for the first time on Saturday.
There were about 400 auctions scheduled around Sydney on Saturday. With 286 of the results in, CoreLogic put the preliminary clearance rate at 60.84 per cent.
Over the week, including midweek auctions, the clearance rate was 66.4 per cent.
The region with the highest preliminary clearance rate was the northern beaches with 80.56 per cent, followed closely by eastern suburbs with 80.36 per cent.
City and inner south was 75 per cent; north shore was 70.69 per cent; both inner west and Baulkham Hills were 66.67 per cent; Blacktown was 62.5 per cent; Ryde was 58.82 per cent; south west was 50 per cent and Parramatta was 36.84 per cent.