Real Estate Agent Lived Under Stone for Nine Months -- Official

Yes, folks, it's official. Your author has recently discovered hard evidence that a local estate agent has been living under a stone for at least the last nine months. I was just perusing the local house listings for our leafy 'burb when I happened across a new property for sale in Allardyce street in Graceville. The detail is a little more sketchy than I'd ordinarily expect, but the available photos suggest a modestly sized house on a confirmed 700sqm of land. The price? An eye-watering $895k! This is the kind of money that was fetched by a renovator on a (slightly) larger block in one of Chelmer's more prestigious high-side streets when the market was at its frothiest i.e. some nine months ago.

Now, I'm no snob, but I do know for a fact that Chelmer's "high-side" sells for a hefty premium over Graceville's "low side" and I wouldn't be surprised to discover that this premium has in fact grown since the recent floods. What on earth possessed the agent to suggest such a price-tag? Yes it's true, they could be masochists.... Personally, I wouldn't fancy doing endless viewings and open houses on a property that had absolutely zero chance of selling at such a nosebleed level. In fact, I'm not certain a 25% haircut would make a lot of difference to the chances. Then again, an agent did recently confide to me that the vendors themselves often called the shots on pricing, so one could view securing the mandate as a 'free option' -- that's if you don't mind the endless hours of fruitless marketing. Anyway, I think it would only be right that someone take this agent aside and point out to them that, while they were living under their stone, the housing market peaked and has been on a steady decline ever since, with recent evidence suggesting that the pace of decline may be picking up. At least, this way, the disappointment of failure won't be as great for the poor soul.

As an aside, the above property may not be the worst offender in the "Egregiously Over-priced" stakes. I did spy a small block of land for sale on the Oxley Road, that comes with planning permission for four 2-bed units, "reasonably priced" (the agent's words) at $1.5m. Mmmm....
Time once again for the cigarette packet and my trusty biro. I reckon you'd struggle to sell a 2-bed unit on the Oxley Rd for much more than $400k (and that's being somewhat generous -- in truth, $300k is more realistic).

But, let's don the rose-tinted spectacles for the sake of this exercise. I bet you've already done the rough mental calculation and concluded that $1.5m is easily 100% over-priced? Four units at $400k gives you a total of $1.6m, which would represent a return of around zero after costs and assuming you didn't spend a dollar building the units. Sounds like a bargain at $1.5m, then!

On closer inspection, it became apparent that the agent with the mandate is based in New Farm. Doing what I do best, I shall go out on a limb here and suggest that land prices in New Farm and Corinda may not be comparable, but I stand to be corrected given the agent's undoubted genius in securing a mandate so far away from his usual patch.