A gold coin could be enough to purchase this regional Victorian house at 1 Mansfield Rd, Benalla – but it comes with a catch.
A regional Victoria home has been listed for sale with the shockingly low declared reserve price of just $1.
The three-bedroom house at 1 Mansfield Rd, Benalla, will be auctioned off mid next month with a gold coin potentially enough to make a bid and buy the property.
But the fire-damaged house, believed to have been the target of an arsonist, is structurally unsound and too dangerous for inspections.
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Even the agents haven’t set foot inside the residence, which still appears to be intact at the front but is clearly damaged at the rear and has streaks left by ash-filled water used to douse the flames in many of the rooms that were not burned.
A drone had to be flown through the property to provide videos and images of what is left.
Ray White Benalla director Peter Symes is handling the sale for the home, which last changed hands for $145,000 in 2018, and said while nobody was harmed in the fire — the house would be very challenging to save.
Mr Symes said he had listed the home with a $55,000-$60,000 estimated sales range, but that the auction reserve would be $1.
The home’s rear has been badly burned, with fire torching its way through from the outside to the interior.
Inside one of the badly burned rooms, where blackened timber studs can be seen.
“We can’t get people on site, it’s too dangerous to inspect,” Mr Symes said.
“The structural integrity is compromised and to what extent, we don’t know.
“You can bulldoze the house, and if you get lucky and you can salvage it, could do well out of it.”
The agent said the current owners had used it as an investment property and that it had been rented out at the time of the fire in July last year.
Mr Symes added that given the nature of the damage to the property, the vendors had been intrigued by the idea of a low-reserve auction — though this would be done online, rather than encourage people to visit the potentially dangerous property for an in-person auction.
If sold at $1, it would wind up costing the new owners a fraction of a cent for each square metre of the about 300sq m allotment.
Fire and water damage can be seen in the home’s kitchen.
One of the home’s living rooms is streaked with dark lines where ash, soot and water have mixed and dripped down the walls during firefighting efforts.
But the agent said he was expecting extensive interest from investors and owner occupiers, as well as tradies, making it hard to be sure what it would ultimately sell for.
“It’s a bit of a unique opportunity for someone,” Mr Symes said.
“And how often do you get the opportunity to pick something up anywhere in Australia for this price?
“The vendors are approaching it in the right way, and at the end of the day they will put it out there and let the market decide what it’s worth.”
He said there was a chance a tradie might try to salvage parts of the existing home, but the likely result would be a bulldozer finishing it off.
From there, he said a buyer could wind up spending anywhere from a few thousand dollars to six figures either putting a relocatable home on the block — or building a new residence there.
With obvious damage to the ceiling, the structure has been deemed too unsafe for inspection.
The bathroom still appears to be intact, if a little worse for wear.
Mr Symes said whatever the approach, the buyer would benefit from an increasingly vibrant Benalla.
Ray White Victoria chief auctioneer Luke Banitsiotis will call the auction and said it was the first one he’d encountered where he would be offering a home for a gold coin, though he had called no-reserve auctions for charity events.
“But I think it shows the vendor has complete faith in the auction process to deliver a result,” Mr Banitsiotis said.
“And it will probably be a great marketing tool. Plus it’s a great opportunity for someone to build on it.”
Real Estate Institute of Victoria president Toby Balasz said the “interesting approach” that highlighted the flexibility vendors should have when choosing to auction a home.
“If you want to explicitly state your reserve – even if it’s a dollar – that’s fine,” Mr Balasz said.
“It just shouldn’t be a government mandate that you have to publicly disclose it.”
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