Year of the auction

The group cleared 67 per cent under the hammer, six per cent higher than the year prior.

Ray White proudly conducts one in four auctions nationally across Australia, representing a dominant 25 per cent auction market share.

It's a fast moving property market. The average days on market for an auction campaign was 26 days across the group, compared with 37 days for private treaty sales. The group’s average post auction sale stood at 30 days.

Ray White’s New South Wales network booked the most with 12,200 auctions, followed by Victoria with 10,400 and Queensland with 7200 auctions.

The auction king of 2023/24 was Ray White Quakers Hill - Tesolin Group principal and owner Josh Tesolin (pictured below with some of his happy sellers), who conducted 373 auctions, more than three times the next highest agent.

The biggest crowds on average were seen on the Gold Coast with 60 people on average attending auctions on the Glitter Strip.

Over the year, crowd sizes were higher than last year with 38 people on average, with September drawing the biggest crowds across Australia with 43 people on average.

Ray White proudly has the best real time market data and tracks its buyer and seller demographics too for every auction campaign.

Across the country, 68 per cent of sellers were owner occupiers and 28 per cent were investors (4 per cent unknown).

In Melbourne, 31 per cent of auction sellers were investors which has been a strong theme since the state government imposed higher taxes there.

One of the most significant metrics the group measures is the highest offer prior versus auction sale price data which shows that on average, auction sales achieved 10.25 per cent more under the hammer for their owners, compared to any offer prior across Australia.

This metric has been consistently around 10 per cent for the last five years, bar the peak of the pandemic boom of November 2021 when it hit 12 per cent.

The top auction sale in the financial year was 116 Victoria Road Bellevue Hill which Ray White Double Bay principal Elliott Placks and director Ashley Bierman sold for $17.13 million with five registered bidders in March this year.

It was certainly a year for huge numbers of bidders.

On average Ray White auctions attracted 4.5 registered bidders, up 0.3 on the prior year and 2.8 average active bidders, up 0.2 year on year, across Australia.

Ray White Sunbury directors Aaron Hill and Marin Durkovic broke all the bidder records with 200 registered bidders attending their 22 Charming St, Hampton East auction.

The Ray White Sunbury directors sold their fourth Block house in a $1 reserve auction for entrepreneur Adrian Portelli. The home was renovated by sisters Eliza and Liberty on the 2023 season of The Block and sold under the hammer for $4.3 million in the series’ final episode to Mr Portelli, who later commissioned the agents to sell the property. It sold for well over the dollar reserve price at $3.245 million to a young couple.

History was also made when Greg Brydon of Ray White Cheltenham sold a converted church at auction while wearing Virtual Reality goggles which meant his sellers could see all the action. The world first VR property auction lasted a total of 9.5 minutes and sold for $1.487 million in April.

The technology worked seamlessly and gave the vendors “a first person view” of the auction. In a high pressure scenario, where the seller's biggest asset is on the line, it is crucial for the auctioneer/vendor to be able to have real time communication without breaking the momentum/emotion of the auction.