Auction lingo is confusing potential buyers and putting them at a disadvantage, according to one buyers’ agent. Patrick Bright of EPS Property Search says buyers need to recognise the terminology used by auctioneers to understand the auction’s progress. “Like many professions, real estate has its own language and terminology that is often intimidating and confusing to outsiders.” Bright says the terminology is designed to elicit a response from potential buyers, but if they read between...
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Whether we have been advising and representing property sellers or buyers, Mitchells have long warned our clients to be wary of auction sales. Sellers beware! A crusty old real estate agent once remarked that an auction was little more than a device for persuading sellers to drop your reserve price. And buyers beware…particularly of vendor or auctioneer bids! Some time ago our Tim O’Dwyer, wearing his Real Estate Watchdog’s hat, gave this on-line warning to...
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by Tim O’Dwyer M.A., LL.BSolicitorConsumer Advocate watchdog@argonautlegal.com.au Walk away to bid another day – but not before the auction is over. Picture yourself as a duly registered, cashed-up bidder at the auction of a seaside mansion. Bidding starts at $6.5 million. You join in as bidding progresses to $7.5 million. Then the auctioneer announces that the property is “on the market” – meaning that the reserve price has been reached and any higher bid will,...
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OPINIONby Peter Mericka B.A., LL.BReal Estate LawyerQualified Practising Conveyancer VictoriaDirector Lawyers Real Estate Pty Ltd The dreaded “dummy bid” never really went away; it simply mutated into a more insidious form through the concept of the “Private Auction”. Bell Real Estate, a prominent real estate agency operating in the Eastern Suburbs and Yarra Ranges areas of Melbourne, uses the “Private Auction” as a standard procedure, and even provides intending purchasers with a set of...
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