Went to another real estate auction yesterday to bid on a house. We really liked this one but it ended up going just a little too high. Had most of the stuff we wanted, but also had a couple of drawbacks. The HVAC system was 20 years old, and it was on a septic system instead of city sewer. Also didn't have a bathroom down in the basement, just two upstairs. It did have an awesome huge kitchen that was added on about 10 years ago, big garage with added on shop area, big yard, and two really nice fireplaces. I was kind of hoping to be able to snag it for somewhere in the 130's including the auction premium, but it ended up at $137.5, plus the 10% auction premium which would make the final price $151,250. That was really more than I was looking to spend, especially given that it wasn't totally perfect and that it was an auction situation.
Felt kind of bad for the dude selling it. One of the other bidders there was his ex-realtor who mainly showed up out of curiosity or to grab it cheap for an investment property if nobody was bidding. It was an estate sale where the guy was getting rid of his parent's old place. According to the realtor guy, the seller had a couple offers earlier this year. One for $170k but they wanted him to put a brand new roof on it even though the roof was only 6 years old and in good shape. Then later he got another one for $150k cash that he turned down thinking he was going to get more at auction. Costly mistake for him.
It was an interesting experience and I'm glad I've got a better idea of how the process works for next time. Seems like most of the bidders there were investors looking to score something cheap. I got the impression that they were regulars on the auction circuit. Most of them seemed to know each other and they all bailed out pretty early. There were only 3 or 4 bidders including us that really did anything.