Allsop raises £55m at UK’s largest ever residential online auction

• Leading auctioneer raises over £55m on 180 lots at the biggest UK online auction ever held – a success rate of 83%
• Highest value lot (a mid-terrace building in Brighton) sold for £1.5m

Allsop’s fourth residential online auction since lockdown – and the largest UK online auction to ever take place – resulted in the sale of 180 lots, raising a record £55m with a success rate of 83%. The team’s fifth auction since the start of 2020, it has brought the total raised from the sale of residential lots by Allsop this year to £212.6m.

The auction saw a total of 4,872 online bids placed during the day, with 700 approved registered bidders. Across the four residential auctions held since lockdown, Allsop have seen 2,683 interested parties approved for bidding.

Gary Murphy, auctioneer at Allsop, said: “This is an exceptional result, which appears to be defying the pandemic. We are £12m ahead of the total raised at our in-room residential auction sale this time last year.”

The largest lot of the day was lot 33, a £1.5m stucco-faced mid-terrace building on 20 Denmark Terrace in Brighton. Arranged as six self-contained flats, each let on assured shorthold tenancies, it produces an income of £71,760 per annum. The sale reflects a yield of 4.49%.

Lot 121, Pencoed Castle near Newport in Wales was one of the most unique lots listed in the September catalogue. This Grade II Listed Tudor castle occupies a 65-acre site that dates back to the Norman times. The property was available with planning permission for restoration of the main building and conversion of its outbuildings to offices. The approved scheme would create 12 new dwellings. Offered with mainly vacant possession, the lot was sold for £1.11m.

Lot 220, a vacant 1.26-acre freehold site in St Helens which was sold on behalf of National Grid, attracted 254 bids, the highest number across all lots, and was eventually purchased for £361,000.

The highest number of registered bidders for a single lot was 22. Between them, they placed 171 bids for lot 205, a pair of freehold bungalows in Wolverhampton previously used as care homes which sold for £704,000.

Murphy also commented: “Since lockdown was eased, we have seen improved activity at our auctions. In particular, the changes to the stamp duty exemption limit has created a new sweet spot in the market. It’s hard to say how long this mini-boom will last, but for as long as it does, it looks to be a healthy environment for sellers. We expect our next auction to be equally busy.”