Newcastle’s cheapest house has gone under the hammer with first-home buyers and investors battling it out

A run-down house in Newcastle described by the selling agent as “the cheapest house in the city” has a new owner.

The two-bedroom, one-bathroom fixer-upper at 112 Woodstock Street in Mayfield sold under the hammer for $627,000 with Wilton Lemke Stewart listing agents Jesse Wilton and Jarrod Dickens.

A last-minute rush of interest from buyers saw the number of registrations jump from eight to 15 at the auction of the deceased estate.

Mr Wilton told view.com.au the majority of bidders comprised first-home buyers and investors in the market to renovate.

An investor placed an opening bid of $500,000 and four of the parties took part in the bidding which went up in increments of $5000 and $10,000 across 15 bids.

It was sold for $627,000 to an investor who plans to renovate the home to lease or sell.

The median house value in Mayfield is $819,000, according to CoreLogic.

“Basically, it came down to the investor versus the first-home buyer market,” Mr Wilton said.

The weatherboard cottage was listed with a guide of $530,000 which made it the cheapest house on offer in the suburb and the most affordable on the market within 10 kilometres of the Newcastle CBD.

Mr Wilton said the property drew strong enquiry throughout the campaign once the guide was dropped to $530,000, with a total of 80 groups inspecting the property.

“The result was well above the interest,” he said.

“We had an original guide of $590,000 and we had no takers because people said it needed too much work, so we lowered the guide to $530,000 and that’s when buyers started to get in.”

Set on 413 square metres, the floorplan included two large bedrooms at the front of the house, a sun room, a dining room and living room.

A rumpus room and laundry was at the rear of the house which retained original features such as plaster ceilings, picture rails and a brick fireplace.

The agent said buyers on the hunt for homes to renovate were slowly returning to the market.

“These buyers are just coming back into the market,” he said.

“Building materials haven’t got any cheaper but with the [house] prices, people aren’t paying overs as much.”

It was one of 29 homes scheduled to go to auction across Newcastle and Lake Macquarie in the week ending February 18.

CoreLogic recorded a clearance rate of 66.7 per cent from from 24 preliminary results, with 16 cleared auctions and 8 uncleared.

This story first appeared on view.com.au