An updated 1959 cottage in O'Connor sold prior to auction last week for $1,425,000, despite the buyers never setting foot inside the property.
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Located at 73 Wattle Street, the four-bedroom home was on the market for just two weeks and last sold in 2010 for $616,000.
With the vendors living in Paris and the tenants wanting to avoid inspections due to their jobs as essential workers, the sale was based solely on photography, video walk-throughs and building reports.
But that didn't stop interest, with a Canberra buyer putting in a strong offer prior to auction.
"We had a lot of interest from buyers in Canberra but also quite a lot of investors from Sydney looking at this property," said selling agent Sally Strang from Home By Holly Dickson.
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Ms Strang said the shift to online inspections and auctions throughout the ACT lockdown meant buyers weren't overly fazed by the process.
"[The tenants] were really cautious about COVID and we respect that the property is their home at the moment. Because of the heat in the market we were able to sell without any physical inspections," she said.
"We had access to all of this technology before [COVID] but the shift over the last 12 months has been really interesting. All of our auctions have been online and we have had no pushback from buyers, they're really happy to participate that way."
For the new owners of this O'Connor home, the appeal was all to do with location.
The home sits on a 663-square-metre block in an RZ2 zone, within walking distance to Lyneham shops, local schools and light rail.
In the ACT, RZ2 blocks larger than 700 square metres can be redeveloped with low- to medium-density units.
The property includes three bedrooms in the main part of the house plus a separate flat with a kitchenette and bathroom. Outside, there's an inground swimming pool and covered patio for entertaining.
CoreLogic data showed this was the highest sale price for a house on Wattle Street, surpassing the last street record of $1,375,000 for a five-bedroom home.
"O'Connor area is a premium area and particularly Wattle Street, it's just going from strength to strength," said Ms Strang.
"[The owners] will potentially live at that location at some stage in the future but they're holding on to it as a rental for the moment."
According to CoreLogic, median house prices in the O'Connor area reached $1,335,000 in July 2021. Just two years prior the median was $960,000.
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