13 September 2014 May Slater
An old housing commission terrace in Sydney's Millers Point has set a new record in the historic inner city suburb, selling for $3.95 million at a secret night-time auction.
An old housing commission terrace in Sydney's Millers Point has set a new record in the historic inner city suburb, selling for $3.95 million at a secret night-time auction.
The Victorian-era five-bedroom house 'Ballara' is the fourth of 293 state-owned houses to go under the hammer in a government plan to sell off public housing and relocate 600 housing tenants.
The sale price was much larger than expected. Buyers were given an estimate of $2.7 million in marketing material handed out before the auction, Property Observer reports.
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| 11 Fort Street in Millers Point sold for $3.95 million last night, setting a new record for terraces in the suburb |
Built in 1879, 'Ballara' is one of several recent heritage listings along Lower Fort Street, which runs from the Sydney harbour foreshore at Dawes Point up to Observatory Hill in the city's historic the Rocks district.
With prime views of the Sydney Harbour Bridge and easy access to the tourist hot-spot the Rocks, the terraces are hotly sought after by developers. The first heritage-listed home at 119 Kent Street recently went under the hammer for $1.9million. The second at 23 Lower Fort Street sold for $2.685million.
The sales have delivered a windfall to the New South Wales government of more than $11million so far, with two more properties - 86 Windmill Street and 30 Argyle Place - due to be sold in the coming weeks, according to the NSW Office of Finance and Services.
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| The old Millers Point social housing terraces command some of Sydney's best harbour views |
But the State government's mass relocation of public housing residents has triggered claims of economic cleaning in the inner city area, and Thursday night's auction saw around 40 Millers Point residents turn up to voice their complaints.
Barney Gardner from the Rocks Public Housing Tenants Group said the heritage of Sydney's first neighbourhood will be lost with the sales.
'They're not only selling the bricks and mortar of the area, they're selling our history and our heritage,' he told the Daily Mail.
'The thing we're really angry about is the fact that some of these properties have been vacant for so many years, some for as many as seven years,' he said. 'The property in Kent St has been vacant for the last three years - meanwhile we have all these people sleeping rough on the streets who could have had a roof over their heads.
'I call it 'eviction by dereliction,' he said. 'We've been asking to get work done on these places for so many years and they wouldn't do it, now they're making repairs because they're going to make some money of their own.'
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| No Surrender: A mural at Lower Fort Street protesting the NSW government's moves to sell off social housing and evict 600 residents at Millers Point |
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The Georgian terrace 'Tarra' sold for $2.68 million, almost double its forecast value
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The Minister for Family and Community Services, Gabrielle Upton, says the sale of the Millers Point properties will return hundreds of millions of dollars to the public housing system to help the 58,000 people currently on the housing waiting list.
'This is all about reinvesting money back into the public housing system by selling properties that are very costly to maintain,' Ms Upton said. 'The age and heritage nature of the Millers Point properties mean they often cost four times as much to maintain as the average social housing property.'
The government says that for every house sold in Millers Point, it can build three houses elsewhere.
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Mr Gardner said the elevated prices being received for the properties raises suspicions.
'How can you undervalue a place by half to a million dollars? One real estate agent told me that if a place goes for 10 - 20 per cent more than it is valued at, that's buyer excitement - but if it goes for 80 - 90% more than expected? Something's wrong,' he says.
A spokesperson for the NSW Office of Finance and Services, who are managing the terrace sales, says the price guide is set by the sales agents.
'They're set by market feedback, obviously there's not a lot of market detail for these kind of properties in the precinct that haven't been sold for 100 years - so the agents are going by what buyers have told them,' he told the Daily Mail.
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| This property at 86 Windmill Street will go to auction later this month |
'We're in a lot of talks with the opposition at the moment. Labour says they'll stop the sale if they get into government, they're formulating a housing policy and have asked for our input,' he said.
'It's hard for some of the more elderly people here, they don't have the energy, but I'll fight this to the end, it's my home. '
RESOURCED: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2754322/Rundown-Millers-Point-terraces-double-price-fourth-terrace-sold-sets-suburb-record.html
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