Just following up on this. Finally settled this afternoon after being on the market for 3 months, with an additional 7 weeks for settlement and finance.
Just a bit about the property itself. 3 Bed/2 Bath + Study, Brick and Colorbond new home, riverside Bayswater, WA. Had 3 agents through to give me a proposal. I got a wide range of estimated sale prices from ~$430K up to $580K. All of the agents explained that it was hard puting a value on the place in the current market. We didn't pay too much attention to the prices given, we were always going to market it at the higher end of the range regardless of the agent as we were not in too much of a hurry to sell.
Ended up going with local agent primarily because of his local knowledge, and focus on this particular suburb.
Initially put it on the market for $560K+ and had a lot of people through on home opens. About 30 per week for most weeks that it was on the market, but no offers.
Dropped to $549K - $569K, and still no offers
Eventually dropped the advertised price to $539K and got 2 offers in. The best one came in at $530K but they pulled out when we countered. The other potential wouldn't go beyond $520K and didn't put the offer in writing.
The next week had a 3rd offer in at $530K. Countered at $535K and accepted.
Purchase price in November 2003 was $275K. I purchased this in partnership with a friend, and it was our PPOR, so there is no Capital Gains payable. This was one of the main considerations when we decided to sell rather than rent it out, and the fact that borrowing against this property was going to be very difficult in the partnership without a lot of risk. We did quite a bit of renovation, including all lights, window fittings, some painting, and all the landscaping and gardening.
This deal will pay off pretty much all of my partner and my non-deductible debt, including the loan for our PPOR.
