Episode 137 | Insights into the Canberra property market: How does it perform against other capital cities? | Claire Corby, Capital Buyers Agency

Find out why the Canberra market is like any other, and discover why its suburbs continue to break local price records.
Every week we chat about Australia's major property markets, but how does Canberra compare and what are its growth prospects? In this episode we speak with Canberran Claire Corby, one of the only buyers agents to work exclusively in Canberra. We discuss the interesting caveats of owning property in Australia's capital city, how has Canberra’s market held up during Covid and what direction is trending towards; will it boom or will it bust?

Here’s what we covered:

• How has the Canberra property market held up during COVID?

• Why has there been a massive disparity in demand for housing and apartments?

• Why Canberra's property market continues to smash suburb price records during COVID

• How have developers shifted in offloading the oversupply of their new builds?

• Why the majority of Canberra property is Leasehold not freehold.

• The weird quirks and caveats of owning property in Canberra?

• What happens with the suburbs that border NSW and ACT?

• What makes a scarce property in Canberra?

• Where are the prestige, blue chip suburbs of Canberra?

This weeks Dumbo:

• Outbidding yourself in Canberra or choosing not to pursue properties because they are going to Auction

RELEVANT EPISODES:
Episode 135 | Eliza Owen
Episode 133 | Alice Stolz
Suburb Trends, July 2020

GUEST LINKS:
LinkedIn - Claire Corby
Capitalbuyersagency.com.au

HOST LINKS:
Looking for a Sydney Buyers Agent? www.gooddeeds.com.au
Work with Veronica: https://linktr.ee/veronicamorgan

Looking for a Mortgage Broker? www.wealthful.com.au
Work with Chris: hello@wealthful.com.au

Send in your questions to: questions@theelephantintheroom.com.au

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT: 
Please note that this has been transcribed by half-human-half-robot, so brace yourself for typos and the odd bit of weirdness…
This episode was recorded in July, 2020.

Veronica Morgan: What's been happening in the Canberra property market this year. Is it immune to price falls because public servants are in stable employment or are they dark clouds in the horizon clouds in part obscured by some new high rise buildings.

Veronica Morgan: Welcome to the elephant in the room. This is the podcast where we love to talk about the big things in property that never usually get talked about. I'm Veronica Morgan, real estate agent buyer's agent cohost of Foxtel's location, location, location, Australia, and author of auction ready.

Chris Bates: And I'm Chris Bates mortgage broker. Before we get started, I need to let you know that nothing we say on you can be taken as personal advice, always recommend you engage the services of a professional.

Veronica Morgan: Don't forget that you can access the transcript for this episode on the website, as well as download our free, full or forecast to report, which experts can you trust to get it right? The elephant in the room.com did I, you

Veronica Morgan: This week, we're finding out what's happening on the ground in our capital city property market from buyer's agent clear Corby clear is an out and proud born and bred Canberran. So we felt she was best placed to give us a Canberra update. Since this has been requested by quite a few listeners, but also some stats have been suggesting that Canberra property has been bucking the trend during COVID-19. So we're very keen to explore why this might be the case. Thank you for joining us today. Claire.

Claire Corby: Thank you for having me.

Chris Bates: Hi Claire. Thanks again. As Veronica alluded to in the, The house Canberra property market ferry, I guess, with this COVID worldwide challenge.

Claire Corby: Yeah. It's been a few months, a very interesting buyer behavior and a, and sell a sentiment as well. So both sides of the equation there and then very different between houses and units, as I'm sure we're seeing in other markets as well, but yeah, very much a two speed economy here in Canberra.

Chris Bates: So when you say you know, differences between houses and apartments, is there parts of the housing market that are also different where you're finding, you know, big differences in terms of the demand and you know, listings, et cetera,

Claire Corby: When COVID firrst came in and we're in this March phase, April phase. Yes, it was a little bit, you know, out in the outer suburbs, also seeing the strong demand that we were seeing from those inner suburbs, but these past few weeks have shown just this weekend, just go home. I've had another couple of suburbs records, blown, blown apart, and they were even ones that were set just a couple of weeks ago. So even in the outer suburbs now we're seeing really strong demand.

Veronica Morgan: So what sort of records are you talking about? You're talking about clearance rates.

Claire Corby: We're talking about price records, suburb, press records. Yes. Sabir price records. So you know where it would have been no seven 50 for one suburb before now that sort of in the mid eighties now.

Veronica Morgan: And so what do you think is driving that? Do you have a scarcity of listings?

Claire Corby: Yes, absolutely strong scarcity of listing. So it's been, been a funny, I think during code, when it first came in and were in that sort of early March phase, if we cast our minds back to act two, when it all first became the pandemic and a lot of those auctions were brought forward that's weekend where we were, okay, this is it. No more auctions after this, we all have to sort of figure out online options. Everyone brought their options forward. And we had this bit of a, a rush on, on auctions then. And since then, I think a lot of sellers have just been sitting on their hands if they don't really need to move or, or have to move on. People are just being bunkering down. But we've been saying a lot of strong demand from people who aren't in a home that's quite big enough to cope with multiple people on zoom and Google Hangouts and meetings and all the rest and the kids homeschooling at the same time. So this sort of upsize a home, very strong demand for that

Veronica Morgan: In other States, you know, we've, we've certainly in new South Wales and I've heard this about Victoria and also Brisbane properties. Typically some auctions were brought forward at the very outset of restrictions, but a lot were withdrawn at high number of properties were taken off the market. And only some of those are sort of trickled back on. Did that same thing happen or do you feel that everything's sold beforehand at the beginning of it?

Claire Corby: No, certainly not everything, but I think there was a vast majority more so some were withdrawn, but since then, you know, agents trying to describe through their book of listings and who they can drum up at the moment just to try and get some sales through. I think, you know, if anyone had an inkling of selling, they've had a bit of pressure from agents telling them now's a great time to do so. So yeah, it's interesting to see maybe there might be a few that are still sitting on their hands, but I think everyone who's been comfortable to transact as biologics have been through that process by now and now we're just waiting for what's going to happen in spring.

Veronica Morgan: And what are the people stealing the big houses? Where are they going?

Claire Corby: Well, that's the other question, isn't it too. So, you know, whether they're just old people or I should say old people, I'll be one of them. So, but it's a it's people who want to probably move to that missing middle of townhouses that they're just not there. I mean, Canberra has a bit of a problem with, I think problem with them with development options. It's quite limited in terms of zoning and also prohibitive in terms of costs. So yeah, this whole missing middle in Canberra is quite pronounced.

Chris Bates: Cause they're building lots of apartments right around the city. I was the, it was late last year. And I was kind of flabbergasted just how many new developments of, you know, one, two bedroom apartments were going up all around the city. And I think they're building a lot of house and land packages on the fringes. Is that right?

Claire Corby: Hmm. So yeah, we lose sort of look at how canvas sort of laid out that whole camera by design thing. Originally the concept was urban sprawl. So sort of, you know, fifties to the sixties, brick and tall homes or the core of Canberra. And then now it's in a bit of a surge now with townships, like Gungahlin and the lawn glow in those Greenfield estates really exploding out to the edges. So that sort of mid two thousands to 10 sort of era of growth there. And then there's talk of that, you know, still expansions to happen in those pockets as well. So there is that, but also I think the governments are looking at well, can we really afford to keep doing this? We canvas sprawling in every direction, trying to be a bit grainy here. Should we go towards urban infill, but there's problems like you say with that, they're just sort of plunking up these 25 plus stories, tall, massive towers, cranes everywhere in the skyline.

Claire Corby: And it's not just in the inner city too. They're going up in satellite townships to the finals and the far South too. But there's such a contrast between the towers that are going up today, then the ones that did last century. So coming into them, not many people having trouble selling them. They are really having trouble selling them. So I think some of the developers are looking for overseas interests, but obviously that's now died fairly well. I'm trying to regenerate interest in those by, you know, adding incentives. There was one numb, a block that went out recently here and they offered everyone a, they just said, look, we're just building it to rent. That's what we're doing now is a build to rent thing rather than trying to sell it to people. If you want to move in, we'll offer you a long lease and two months rent free period, and they couldn't run fast enough. It was such strong demand.

Chris Bates: Yeah. But I mean, I guess the developer has got to be able to hold that right. So generally the development model is to build and sell and then go on to the next one and keep on banking, the cash and reinvesting the profits. But, you know, build to rent is a completely different proposition to a developer. And you know, if they didn't design the buildings in that way and the whole structure and tax and things like that, it's a pretty dire situation. I imagine for most developers they wouldn't wanna go.

Claire Corby: Yeah, there's been a couple of actually shelved they're big developments as well. So it's still sitting as a CAPA. Yeah. Yeah. The plans were to get that out of the ground soon. So that's just been shelved. So I think it's good that sort of seeing a little bit of a stop in that pipeline of supply because it's just the glue an over supply.

Chris Bates: Yeah. And you said there's a real scarcity that sorta upsize are, you know, you know, bigger family sort of homes around the city where you find those and obviously the strongest demand in Canberra and not enough.

Claire Corby: Yes. Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, those, like I said, that sort of era, that camera was built in this sort of post-war mid century stuff. It wasn't exactly a big home, big footprint by then. It was built for public servants to live in and quite modest, generally speaking of course, there's pockets that are a bit more expensive than others, but yeah. Yeah. So people, I think wanting that, that bigger house and not so much a huge yard, of course there are people that always want a bit of land underneath them too, which is good. But yeah, there's definitely a strong demand for people to have multiple living spaces now. So those are the types of hires that are going to auction and are driving our strong auction clearance rights too.

Veronica Morgan: And that's a good point there that not everything goes to auction. Are you saying that, that, that, I mean, I guess what proportion of property would you say goes to auction and you just say the sort of the smallest stuff you, it would always, you put it in the price anyway.

Claire Corby: He's always saying different units. Yes. Yeah. It depends on how well it's presented. I think if you even have a smaller home, it's really well presented in a good suburb that gets absolutely strong demand of those, take it to auction. But sometimes what might happen there we're seeing at the moment is they're being sold prior to auction because there is such strong interest.

Veronica Morgan: What sort of volumes of, you know, how many properties would go to auction on a typical Canberra and weekend,

Claire Corby: But this year has been so atypical, hasn't it? So we've been seeing very, very low numbers recently in the forties and fifties. It's very, very low, whereas on a busy weekend, we might see that up in hundreds. Right. So who's to know what's around the corner in spring, I'm hearing whispers that supply, you know, is on the way.

Chris Bates: And so if you're buying, let's say not buying at auction, are you going private treaty? Like what's the usual sort of process that you do in act like in different States, we do different things, you know, you know, 66 W's in, for example, new South Wales and Queensland, you do it a bit different as well. I mean, what, what's the usual process down there.

Claire Corby: Yeah. Yep. So here we have a standard 30 day settlement period. So it's a little bit shorter than the 42 across the border in new South Wales. But of course there are usually a bit of leniency from vendors to say, Hey, well maybe 45 or 60, but yeah, that's sort of our common goalposts that we walked work towards and yeah, for private treaty, we a 66 w sort of equates to a section 17 years. So, you know, same, same different names. Yeah. So that's all very similar process, but of course we've got quirks such as, although, you know, the lease hold crown lease titles and things like that too. Not so much the freehold title.

Veronica Morgan: Yeah. Wonder why I ask about that? So is every property in the act purchase with Elise leasehold rather than freehold and there was a tiny pocket out near the airport that is free freehold and I'm the group out there that own, that land developed that a little bit, you might have seen when you've been landing into Canberra, but by and large, yes.

Claire Corby: Huge expanses of Cranley. So we all have a 99 year lease to the crown for our block of land. And those are going through the renewal process for a few that are coming up for their lease renewals.

Veronica Morgan: So how does that work? Because it's like, so it starts off with 99 and then you might own a property for 20 years. And so the next person buys a 79 year lease. Right.

Claire Corby: They inherit the remainder of the lease. Yep. That takes on. And at the end of 99 know, it's been, what I understand would be happening is it just rolls over for another dollar for another 99 years.

Veronica Morgan: Sounds ridiculous. Really. It sounds like a lot of, a lot of red tape down here I guess, is it's creating and sustaining a few jobs, but how does it in practicality in practical terms, has it work? I mean, particularly with an apartment, for instance. So that means the entire apartment building is also built on leasehold land rather than freehold land. Right. So you, you're buying your, share your apartment within a Australia building and also paying your bit towards whatever, whatever is remaining on that that lease. So it does, it does it, I mean, because I know a lot of you know, Canberra agents,

Claire Corby: You, you deal on both sides of the border. I dunno. Do you deal on both sides of the border, new South Wales as well as act, you kind of have to be, it's an extension really? Queanbeyan is just love it.

Veronica Morgan: Yeah. But different, but different legislation in property. Right. So is there a practical sense of how it works, that it is quite obviously different or is it literally just the lease holder thing?

Claire Corby: It stops a lot of people, you know, they don't quite understand it or they're fearful, let's say, well, what happens if, what happens? If, well, we'll be having a mess example of, you know, the movie, the castle there's compulsory and positions back. Well, I don't know that they want to buy all these properties back in camera. You never know it could be around the corner, but I don't think so. So yeah, in effect it's, by and large, very, very similar to buying across the border. You get block of land. It's fairly well yours to do what you want. We do have some quirks. You mean you can't put up a fence in the front of your property, much as you might see walking us new South Wales, there's no fence. I really don't even notice pages. Okay. You can have sort of open style with some pillows and things, but you can't have a solid front fence. Wow. So that's a caveat basically. Yeah. Kind of. Yeah. And then also we don't have development on hilltops here. Same on we'll crown. Yeah. So, you know, obviously in other coastal towns and things like that, you might have someone elevated to catch the breeze here. All of those are just public reserves walking trails around them.

Chris Bates: Yeah. That on the satellite, actually there's lots of obviously natural reserves and et cetera, is this land that's unlikely to never be built on like, are they, is there all this allocated land that's been sort of set aside to avoid over development? Or are they slowly just getting changed?

Claire Corby: No. No, I wouldn't say they're getting changed at all now. I think it's part of, well notice. I never, of course, but I can't see a time where we're going to see development on all hilltops in Canberra.

Chris Bates: And what about the other natural reserves at the sort of, kind of Parklands waved in, Hey, Matt, but it just, I just wonder with you know, they're gonna one by one over time, just Get kind of sold off.

Claire Corby: Yeah. There is a territory plan. So there are some flags where they're going to do development where they're not, so there are pockets throughout that are actually reserve as well and they, they're not going to be developed. And they've actually said, this is not for development. And then there's other parts that are so, yeah, but overall camera's sort of, you know, talks about itself as being the Bush capital. I don't know if that's going to change with this, as I said, this era of growth with this surgeon and Greenfield going out and out. And when is it time to actually look about going inwards and having that urban infill. So who's to know whether Kevin McCloud was here last year. I think saying, you know, Canberra's right for development. So yeah, by and large, there's not much that goes over three stories tall, unless it's a 25 story monstrosity. I have no gaps. The gap

Veronica Morgan: W when we talk about infill saying in Sydney, you know, we're talking about repurposing or rezoning industrial previous industrial sites what would be rezoned in Canberra if you were going to townhouses or sort of more modest apartment developments?

Claire Corby: Yeah. Yeah. Good point. So, you know, of course our industrial is very much planned Canberra being very much a planned city of course, and all those lovely roundabouts we have. But yeah, so it's more so I'd be looking towards changing the density within the suburbs. So at the moment, it's very much based around the inner, just these few streets can have high density zoning. And even in that it's more towards unit titling than it is subdivision in Canberra. So sort of, I guess, being more permissive in saying to people, yes, you can just chop the blocking half, two separate titles off you go. Or is it at the moment the still going to be this little bit of common property that sits between the two that's missing.

Veronica Morgan: You're suggesting that that There's needs to be an age where a lot of that mid century original type of Canberra and home really gets knocked down the block subdivided potentially duplexes put on them. Is that sort of thing

Claire Corby: You'll say, Oh, I don't think I really liked to say that I love canvas history in that mid century style. I think we've got a lot of that and yeah, it'd be good to see. A lot of people do take that on and love it and enhance it. Even if someone's going to

Veronica Morgan: So someone was going to chop the block in half. What are you suggesting that they battleax lots of battleax blocks. I mean, where is the land going to come from? If, if In this middle ring there's going to be high density.

Claire Corby: Yeah. Good point. So it depends really on block by block basis. A lot of them were built, so there is a big parcel of land at the back, but what's been stopping a lot of development has also been tree issues. So there's been a lot of tree protection, which is a good thing in itself, of course. But if we can maybe then look at a, well, instead of that one tree, can we replant a couple of trades and actually make the block even greener, but still, maybe going upwards as well? I'm not sure what the solution is, but yeah, I'm sure someone creative will come up with a great solution.

Veronica Morgan: Is there a lot of acreage on the, on the outskirts of Canberra and he's that good Murrumbateman and places like that I'm thinking of. Um and is that the sort of area that he's getting now subdivided in these house and land packages being built he's at the type of,

Claire Corby: We saw a little bit of that, where we had a cross border development over in Westville Connor, nothing camera's Northwest. So stress man and McNamara the two there. So there was a bit of an issue there at first. I think we're trying to figure out how say she had us a suburb that straddled the two, the, so the regional new South Wales cancel yes. Council. They going to drive an hour into Canberra to pick up the garbage for these several streets and then drive all the way back out to, yes. So is camera going to service it? So routes, how are the buses going to service that route? You know, it's just, there's a lot of issues to work through. And so I think, you know, new South Wales also had a look around the border and does it look five Ks around that perimeter of Canberra? Let's look at making that a no development zone and a lot of the landholders, they said, well, hang on a second. Not so sure about that. You know what I'm saying? The value in my property so disappeared. So there was a bit of RGBD and a bit of trying to figure out where we're going to go with this at the moment.

Chris Bates: Yeah. I started to see now Sydney and Melbourne, we've seen this, COVID allow people to look at alternative type of properties because commute isn't as important as it was. Is there parts where people are say living around the city in Canberra saying, well, I prefer to live, you know, in lifestyle hubs, outside the city, for example, and commute, you know, 30, 40, 50 minutes to Canberra, if they do need to come in, you know, do you find that there's a spread of people going out or do people really still want to live around the city?

Claire Corby: I think that was always a bit of a trend before covert people that were attracted to clamber for it's very much, it's laid back casual lifestyle. And even though you can't be 20 minutes to anywhere anymore, it has gone a little bit busier. It's certainly not by any stretch of the imagination is as troublesome as the biggest cities. So I think they will, who do like to be out of the way and, you know, have their own bit of turf and I'm away from it all. They will already sort of in those pockets around, around camera, on the outskirts and those anchorages I'm not too sure whether we'll see an increase demand on some of the coastal towns are saying, you know, absolutely seeing a trend from the baby, boom is just brushing off and, and taking, seeking refuge and saying, let's, we're going to have to be there. Where can we be as well? But Tammy Canberra, I think a lot of people that like to be near, but have restaurants and a bit of lifestyle, you know, the arts and museums and things like that and entertainment, that's where they want to be honest. It's not, it's like they're right in the thick of it. They're not surrounded by monstrosities of Dallas in, in most of the, in most of it. But yeah, it's very laid back

Chris Bates: Batemans Bay. It's probably a bit too far and things like that. Yeah.

Claire Corby: Yes. Yeah. It doesn't quite have the infrastructure in the medical facilities as well. So a lot of people find that they then come back to Canberra for, for need of, of those sorts of services as well.

Chris Bates: And what about PayPal clinic? Do you find that you know, like for example in Adelaide is a bit of a brain drain, right? Like the university students, you know, study there, get a great education and they go look for a job, can't get something that's gonna get them started. So they moved to Melbourne or Sydney, et cetera, or overseas. And then they come back to Adelaide, you know, in their thirties, forties because they want to start a family or they don't want to be around their parents, et cetera. Do you find that in Canberra as well, where people kind of grow up and they move away and in there they come back and these, that conduct increasing,

Claire Corby: I think for my generation, yes. Everyone seemed to go off and do that, that gap year and then travel a little bit. But everyone's now coming back to settle down and have families. Absolutely. But I'm not sure if that will change. And also it depends. I think on whether they've their parents are here, it's a lot of people come here for work. It's quite cyclical, sort of town in that way. It's turns people out every, every few years, once their contract's done. Some people just never quite settle in. And some people do counter towns, they all look up. I never quite found my tribe. I never felt like it was home and that sad. So I think that's a big part of helping people to settle in and assimilating and, and finding their people here. And and hopefully it does feel like home for them. Cause for me, yeah, gosh, I could never leave. My family would be me saying, no, there's just too much history here for us.

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Veronica Morgan: Do you have any data on, you know, the amount of people that would move there for work? You know, and obviously, you know, obviously it's a public servant town people who are in the public service that really want to move up to federal level. That's seen as the height of their career and opportunity, you know, on a national basis rather than state-based politics. So, you know, I guess what do, is there any data on the proportion of people that actually would actually buy when they moved there versus those that would rent?

Claire Corby: I don't have any hard data on that, but I mean, anecdotally, there's always this saying within public service to, or it's late to Canberra. So a lot people do get in touch and say, look, I need to buy something because I know in the coming years we will be there. And we just want to make sure that we've got the right property because we don't want to do the whole move twice. We want to get the schooling, right. This is important for us. So we'll just buy something now, rent it out and then we can move straight in.

Veronica Morgan: So if that's your career path that's seen as being on the ultimate, that's like going to head office, head office or wherever it might be over at Russell. Yes.

Chris Bates: But then when they, they come and do their contract for, they get the position for three or four years, et cetera, they kind of come and do that. And then they leave. Do you find there's a lot of people kind of come in and out or the city is so you're finding there's a lot more turnover because of that in terms of properties. Whereas a lot of capital cities, people kind of buy in and then they kind of hold and then upgrade within the suburb and they stay there for a long time.

Claire Corby: I think it depends which department there are. No, of course, you know, the military as well. That's definitely, you know, getting, getting sent around and posted around Australia more so, but yeah, a lot of the other agencies that yet once I do get to Cambra, they'll, they'll settle down and stay career public servants, move up through the ranks. So it just depends on which agency they're with too, if we're talking public service.

Veronica Morgan: And what are the industries are growing or available for people to work in outside the public service.

Claire Corby: Yeah. So education tourism and also the small business of startup sector as well. So there's a couple of, of bigger, bigger agencies. If you've heard of like a way that payment processing was seeing machines this is a couple of really big startups that, that sort of made Canberra their own home. So Canberra as well. I used to take government or try to really foster that that environment and putting in place and some initiatives to go to for want of a better word, trying to say it without having some government spin come out of my mouth, but I'm trying to foster, I guess, that culture of, of being encouraging and helping startups. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Right.

Veronica Morgan: And I guess in the startup sector, that's probably the most flexible agile sector in terms of where their people come from. You know, a lot of them are online for instance, and dealing with digital digital technologies. I mean, do people need to live in Canberra or to work for them.

Claire Corby: Or sometimes yes. Sometimes no. A lot of people, you know, were actually brought in for some of these startups and helping them to find their own place to live while they're here. I think it's just a matter of what do people want, do they want to be remote or do they want to be here and then just, you know, travel away for some annual leave when it gets cold and we all run away and defrost, which we, which we haven't quite done this year, but yeah. I don't know if that trend might change as we now become used to working remotely, but for now it's sort of thing. Yes. Do come here for work.

Chris Bates: And then I know from investment point of view you know, where do you find that, you know, there's actual scarcity, it's good value for money, you know, the yields pretty RK. It's not like, you know, that prestige area, for example where do you think, you know, a good price point for people to enter the Canberra market to get us really scares property?

Claire Corby: Mm Hmm. Good question. Yeah. So I think, you know, there's a couple of different, good value propositions in terms of without wanting to give away the secret sauce. Of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But if we're looking at units and some of those older buildings, there's older complexes, so they really don't build them like they used to. So yeah, being good walking distances on the lifestyle areas around Kingston and that in a South area location there, some of those are so well-built and, you know, without the flashy pools and the rooftop gyms and the cinemas and all the rest, the holding costs can be quite low and really in demand from those people that do come to town and don't necessarily want to buy so they can offer a really good a great property from that side of things. Very good investment grade.

Claire Corby: So, you know, Brown team might be talking 500, 600 K anything up to sort of 1.5 for townhouses in around that area to good quality stock houses. Yeah. Yeah. So it depends of course, you know, always working with the different risk profiles of investors and what their tolerance for. I find Canberra does tend to draw a more risk averse crowd. My they liked the less volatile market of Canberra, as opposed to say Sydney, Melbourne wouldn't have those yeah. Those heart stopping moments sometimes. But yeah. So, I mean, gosh, our medians within that mid seven marks, I think you've got something sort of 700, 800 ish, you know, scraping the bottom of the barrel, trying to get something in a problem area. Yeah. But you're not necessarily paying top dollar for something just to be in a, in a prestige school catchment area or anything like that.

Chris Bates: Okay. And what are the prestige parts of Canberra? Like what are they going for? Is it twos? Is it three?

Claire Corby: Oh, if we're talking freestanding homes yes. Sort of 1.5 to 2.5 is pretty popular price range for that. Well, prestige home is it's pretty common for someone to have sort of between one and 1.5 and there's very strong demand in Miami for anything up to one.

Veronica Morgan: And what suburbs are the prestige suburbs?

Claire Corby: So our blue chip area is out in a South. So I've got Kingston all around. If you've been to Monica, we say, Monica not menuca. So that's our little lifestyle entertainment's around there. And then Boston and that whole pirate triangle South of the light at the end of that sort of spilling out a find of people start to get priced out of there. They're looking at the Garren, the Hughes, the curtain is spilling out to that sort of top of Woden. Yeah. So it really depends what sort of look and feel thereafter. And I think school of course drives a lot of decision making in that area too. So we've got Canberra grammar girls and well, I should say girls coed, smart girls And boys anymore. It's girls and coed and a couple of other private schools in that area that have been very popular with families looking to get into those areas.

Veronica Morgan: So people wanting to, because obviously if you're getting your children into a private school, you don't have to worry about a catchment area. You're just talking about convenience, are you?

Claire Corby: Yes. Yeah, absolutely. Just, yeah. The kids can get the cells to and from, especially when they're talking by younger kids that can't quite just hop on the bus yet and off they go. So yeah. Whereas, you know, just that whole, I guess that inner South area certainly can get a bus, but buses, aren't great in Canberra. Let's spend a bit of a bugbear for people here for a while. So say if you did live in the outer suburbs and he wanted to go to some of those schools, it might mean you wouldn't be home for an hour and a half in the afternoon.

Veronica Morgan: Is that the only form of public transport?

Claire Corby: All we've got our light rail now. So yes, that goes from the city at the moment out to the Gungahlin town center. So it's a trend up and down North Bourne Avenue and not one of those outer suburbs you mentioned earlier on up to the North and how far away from the city would that be for the CBD? Oh gosh, off the top of my head, I'd say around about eight, nine kilometers.

Veronica Morgan: I only laughing because it's in my head, I'm thinking, wow, that must be a long way. It must be like 30 Ks. You say, I don't know. But and that's just my Sydney Sydney mentality taking over there. So I'm laughing at myself, not at Canberra. One of the things that you mentioned earlier, you talked about sort of apartments in Kingston. And the inner South obviously been quite an established area and quite high demand and very accessible to all the lifestyle that, you know, Canberra offers cat cafes and galleries, et cetera, et cetera. You did touch on build quality and those older apartments that are more solidly built. Now I remember watching a four corner story was around bill quality, probably when mascot towers, you know, when we first hit the mascot towers issue. And there was in particular one example of a development in Canberra.

Veronica Morgan: I don't know exactly where I'm not sure if, you know, okay. And there was a, you know, there was a case study there of a young girl and that was her first home. And basically saying that she's got to actually come up with more money to be able to, to contribute to all the major works that required to be done to that property, to that building that she'd go bankrupt now, you know, and it's funny because, you know, the PR the publicity was very much around Sydney properties, Sydney apartments. And I thought it was quite interesting that obviously this is an issue that's been happening in Canberra as well. Would you say you've come across it a lot. Would you say that this is something that's more widespread than people recognizing?

Claire Corby: Well, I think, you know, in terms of build quality it's yes, we've got a separate of all that cladding, combustible cladding issue, which we're finding on more and more buildings now as well. So that I think people need to be aware of as well, for sure. But Camera's such a small town that people generally know everyone, those movements and, you know, there's Phoenix companies go there, they just get set up chunky brothers and then day two, they're called chunky brothers number two or whatever. You tend to know what they build and where they are. So, but in not everyone will and some of the other glossy marketing and the hype out there, people do get stuck in, suck it into things. So there's been other cases down in Tuggeranong where developers have actually gone bust and everyone's lost their deposit on, off the plan. So, yeah, it's definitely a bit of a problem here in terms of you know, looking at things like private ties certification as well. Should that be brought back and yeah, cause at the moment it's just, everyone's mates just signing off on everyone else's work. It's just, hasn't got that.

Claire Corby: I feel it hasn't got that. Gosh, bust. Yes, it has in place. Yeah. And I think bias is definitely at the moment, Kevin damped or by beware and say that you need to really do your due diligence on what you're buying to make sure that, you know, you've put it through the rigors and you know what you're in for? I never, no one ever really knows what's around the corner, especially in things like 40 corporates. But yeah, you do want to know the history of what's that builder, what sort of stock is built as well. And you know, how many flashy extras and how much extra for marketing you're paying, but also some of them are now you're flushing around saying, look, if anyone buys any stock, we'll give them 20 grand. You think, well, if that's the center, why don't you discounting the stock in the first place to charge rubbish?

Veronica Morgan: I had a conversation with an agent yesterday who rang me about a, an apartment building that he's trying to sell the apartments. He said, you know, I haven't been getting any traction from buyer's agents for this and no kid it's on a main road, but it's really nicely finished and all the rest of it that the owners want to know whether, whether buyer's agents would be attracted with the bonus of a Tesla, if they purchased the property, when the clients and artists went, why don't they just knock the cost of a Tesla off the price you'd ever been? Just like, Oh my God, you've missed the point if the price is wrong. But also the very fact is you boot a development on a main road and people don't want to buy on a main road now, you know, all of the trades. So tell me things like, well, you can't Polish a turd. Yeah.

Chris Bates: Do you find that in Canberra, there's a, you know, the compromised properties are selling a lot, slow up, potentially not knowing much competition. Yeah.

Claire Corby: Yes, absolutely. Yeah.

Chris Bates: One of the main compromises down there that obviously the busy roads, but is there others that are really, you know, stand out that, you know, whether it's, you know, council restrictions or whether it's the lights or

Claire Corby: Yeah. Sometimes it's around around location. Now we have our public housing scattered throughout the suburbs too. So that tends to be pockets of desirable, less desirable, but sometimes it's also around orientation, you know, are these homes that sort of built in that postwar period? Well, let's just pump it up and it's facing South. Don't worry about it. Should we? Right. And our climate doesn't really tolerate that. So if you've got a very poorly insulated home that faces South well, good luck shifting it, especially now that rural sort of looking about, you know, living greener yeah, very, very hard to shift something that doesn't have good natural light, especially in these cool months.

Chris Bates: That's where you need the, a new person to Canberra to buy those ones, I guess, right.

Veronica Morgan: From out of town that thinks I know the market well, that happens everywhere. It doesn't, it do have a bit of a chuckle about some of the assumptions that out of area buyers make that a local would never make. Oh yes. It's a bit of a shame. Isn't it too. Cause you do hear some of the stories, sales agents tell you, they're proud of the fact that this person did that and you just think, Oh no, that's my head. And just think, Oh, well hopefully time heals all wounds.

Veronica Morgan: We're going to ask you for Dumbo. But if you include any of those examples in your Dumbo no, I don't think I have tell us some of the stories. I mean, I think this is important for buyers to understand that agents know when you've made a dumb decision, they don't care because at the end of the day, they've got to sell the property. It's not, they're limited by what, what stock they've got. They're not focused, their focus isn't on having you buy the right property for you, but afterwards they often have a bit of a sneaker and think, Jesus, I hope they're not going to bring that back to me to sell again in a hurry because they just paid a Matson for something that's really difficult to shift. And are there many majors of that to me over the years. And I used to say to when I was a sales agent, so have you, can you give us a couple of examples?

Claire Corby: Oh gosh, absolutely. I mean, there's always the one, you know, the out of town or that comes, drives down on a Saturday morning and thinks they're spot on an absolute bargain and you know, wax a big 50 K bid on top when they really didn't need to. And everyone else stands there looking at them going, Oh my goodness, Mayo, there was one. Yeah. In his case it was a hundred K bid. And the auctioneer actually said, can I please confirm your bid? That is a hundred thousand bid you're putting on top. And they thought they were just the slightest thing since sliced bread. Right.

Chris Bates: It came straight from his hot Sydney auction and thought that that's the way that you need to do it. I mean, are they a lot of them pricing the properties wrong as well, because they're not sure what to compare them against and what is actually, you know, the lifestyle and the weather and things like that. What's actually the right. You know, what's actually a good deal. What's not,

Claire Corby: Are you talking about the buyers pricing?

Chris Bates: Yeah. And I bet out of area buyers probably say, I know that one up the road sold for 1.2. So yeah.

Claire Corby: I don't think they even know that sometimes when I drive into town. So yeah, sometimes I was looking at buys or bidding on social proof, which is option, contract review, no preparation, no due diligence, just looking on social proof,

Claire Corby: What won't be the typical profile, these people that actually move about to move to Canberra. All, some people know the locals to it too. I hear stories on the grapevine as well. So it's a bit of a worrying trend I'm spending upwards of a million dollars or so without any real thought or, or they just turn up and think, Oh, this isn't, this is going cheaper than I thought it would. I should jump in here. Well, it's not exactly a mate raffle. And is it, but is this something you finding at the moment is specifically around those sort of upgraded type properties where there is scarcity and there is high demand or is this something that you actually see quite a lot? It might be those ones that, you know, perhaps they've got a bit of a stigma, but the auction culture here is, you know, take that freestanding home, take it to auction and maybe just doesn't get quite the result that you might have seen. It's not quite an, a grade property. Yeah. So it tends to happen more so in case of an auction or if it is an a grade, yeah. Someone just makes a stupid, stupid move that they didn't necessarily need to do

Chris Bates: The things that the locals just go crazy about. Me, not, you know, it might be in Sydney, it might be a view or it might be a really nice frontage, the same in Melbourne. You know, it might just be a beautiful treeline street for example, but what are some of the things in Canberra the way, you know, the locals are always having a very high on their kind of buyer preferences.

Claire Corby: Hmm. Yeah. Good question. I think it depends. It's definitely different types of buyers that like different things. Those that like the unique aspects of Canberra and that mid century design, if they can see a really good sympathetic renovation done well, that makes that home really usable for the model requirements, indoor outdoor flow, good orientation, those basics. But then they might've opted with, you know, double glazed windows and great insulation and make the garden beautiful because a lot of Canberra gardens do have that beautiful aspect to them where you can really go with some, all four seasons. So yeah, they will definitely have a strong, strong demand for buyers.

Chris Bates: Yeah. So the one who's renovated or renovated a beautiful sort of mid century home, but done it really well. That's where, you know, you probably see them not done that. Well, I guess.

Claire Corby: Yeah. Oh gosh. And especially through the eighties, you might've had a beautiful 1950. So when they came through with their apricot tiles and gold taps with swans on the most of the thing yes.

Veronica Morgan: That I often think that that's where some of the best values the house it's got everything in the right spots, but just really horrible, shocking, non an eighties of 1990s decor. Yeah. Tell us about the Dumbo you've brought for us.

Claire Corby: Mm yes. So I, from time to time get inquiries from people that say, I'm just, I don't want to deal with any property that goes to auction. I just hate auctions. I'm not going to go anywhere near them. I don't want to touch them with temporal pole. The problem being that our great, great properties are the ones that go to auction. So they're cutting out some of the best options on the market from a position of fear. So, and also I think that the auction can have some really good benefits for buyers too.

Chris Bates: It's funny. You're right. Like there is actually, you know, people have got these sort of beliefs and things that I definitely don't want to do, but there's always a cost to those.

Claire Corby: In some cases they end up making a pre auction offer to avoid that whole process. I'm saying some sizable pre auction prices right now.

Veronica Morgan: Yeah. Well, that's, that's something that is often the case that yeah, they're trying to avoid is jumping from the frying pan into the fire, really that without really fully understanding exactly what you're doing and how to pitch that offer and how to deliver that offer, then it's so easy to overpay prior to auction. It's one of the reasons why banks, you know, you often talk to bank valuers and they'll often say, look, it's, it's better to go to auction. Cause we, we, we know that there was competition. Now the reality is we all know that there isn't always competition at auction or somebody has come along and made a hundred thousand dollar bid over the next one. And, and there's no proof that there was anybody close to that, but it is something that value is sort of lean towards to say, there's more confidence around that price being achievable again, versus an offer made prior in the absence of competition which as you say, can be driven from fear.

Veronica Morgan: So it is an interesting approach. A lot of people don't realize that they're actually it's day more dangerous water sometimes in an auction,

Claire Corby: Especially in a rising market where they think I've just got to get this one they're buying out of FOMO. Yes. At the moment, we're all kind of seagulls on a, on a good chip when we see a good chip land. But yeah, I think there's some, definitely some big mistakes that will take some people a bit of time to realize when they're bragging about it at their, well, they're not really having barbecues at the moment, are they? Their COVID safe distance barbecues, man. But yeah. Some of these bragging rights and people realize when they move in down the street, people talk to them and say, Oh gosh, that was a big price. Yeah. Wow. And it might make them think twice then

Chris Bates: The market is priced on sentiment. Right. So, you know, when you're saying there's a FOMO, et cetera in the market, have you seen really a change with sentiment with this, you know, 2020 in the covert situation? I know obviously Melbourne now it wouldn't be great. And Sydney is a little bit fearful now as well. I mean, has that really played out in the market or is it, do you see things that just pretty much continue, but maybe keep your distance?

Claire Corby: Yeah, I think it's, it is a bit of continue, but keep your distance. If we're talking freestanding homes, I think people still, and maybe it is the public service X factor that we know people are feeling quite secure in their jobs. So we'll see where I'll be playing in a bit. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. You know, some of the government signs are going up around town, you know, coming up to election time saying, Oh, we're going to develop this road. We're going to do this. We're going to improve that. So there's a bit of, bit of promises being made as well. But I think, yeah, some people feeling quite secure in their jobs and perhaps that overseas holiday that we're going to take that budget lucky then put towards

Veronica Morgan: Yes, makes a bit difference. Just, Oh, I shouldn't laugh. I was meant to be visiting my sister in Italy last month. And obviously that was kibosh and I certainly didn't get all the money back that I'd spent on tickets either. So it's a bit disappointing. But yes, you're right. That lack of travel options are certainly you to add some, some money to some people's budgets. For sure. They're spending so much time at home and locked down. I've really been quite critical of what they want. And so when they say something comes up, that's a pretty good option. There's a lot of competition for it. Yeah. Interesting.

Chris Bates: Is there much competition with other buyer's agents? You know, a lot of the time potentially in Sydney, the good property comes on, especially when there's low stock, there's potentially one or two buyers, agents competing against each other. But you know, from my understanding, there's not that many buyers agents in Kansas city, are you rarely coming up against other

Claire Corby: Very rarely. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't really happen a whole lot. Yeah.

Veronica Morgan: Do you know Chris, even in Sydney, it's unusual for me to come up against a buyer's agent at auction, you know, it's certainly, I don't think I've ever come across two at an auction, but I can think of maybe, maybe once I've had more than one other sometimes I'll have one, but more often than not, I don't have anybody, any other buyer's agents. So I think the uptake of, you know, if a buyer wants an advantage, then they need to get themselves a buddy. Good buyer's agent. It is an advantage, but I'm this, it's still quite a low uptake.

Claire Corby: When you look at sort of the, the amount of people in the market using a buyer's agent, it's very, very low. Yeah.

Veronica Morgan: So Claire, thank you so much for coming along and sharing a bit of insight into the Canberra market. We haven't done a Canberra based episode thus far, and we have been asked for it. So it was good for us to get some insights into what's driving that market, what buyers like and you know, and what's getting competition at the moment as well.

Claire Corby: Well, thank you. I hope your listeners got something out of it.

Chris Bates: Thank you very much, Claire chase. We want to make you a better elephant rider. And this week's elephant rider training is

Veronica Morgan: It's something I've been thinking about quite a lot is the ease of which it is to buy a certain types of property. And we talked with Claire about a lot of these high rise apartments that are being built in Canberra. And the fact that obviously with a slowdown on immigration and tourism, et cetera, et cetera, that it's uppy and also investors being very reticent to get into the property market, that it appears that there's a lot of incentives being paid by the developers to actually shift this stock. Now it's a bit the same with house and land packages. You think about a first home buyer given all this money to go out there and buy something brand new. You go out there to a showroom, you'd basically pick your block of land off a map. You pick your house design and so on a contract and done easy, right?

Veronica Morgan: Well, buying property is, should be difficult because the thing is that the easier it is to buy a property, generally speaking, the harder it is to sell that property. And I think that this is something that a lot of buyers and particularly first time buyers, and I've been working with a lot of them lately with on home buyer Academy, something that they really need to understand that this is a big decision with lifelong implications. And if you find yourself, you know, going down the easy path, because it, it seems easier. And the, and the other way I going to auction or trying to compete for limited stock, where there is scarcity, where other buyers want that property then, and you think I'm going to go the easy way. Then you need to sell down the track. You're going to find it quite difficult to sell because there aren't as many buyers for that sort of property. Whereas if you compete for something that is a grade that is very much in demand and has, you know, there's more buyers out there that want it, then there are sellers wanting to sell it. Then when you go to sell, there's a high likelihood that you're going to find it easy to sell. So difficult to buy hard, to sell hard, to buy difficult, sorry, easy to sell.

Chris Bates: I really liked that. Cause you know, it's, you could just think God, it's easy to, it's hard to buy. And so it's easy to sell, but there's probably different levels to it. And I think it's, it's breaking that down. I mean, you're going to go through the pain at some point, whether you do the Hottie ads now and which is going to get you the returns and actually get something that grows or whether you going to do the hard yards to sell it and don't get the return. So, you know, it, doesn't just defies all logic to not want to do it up front. And you know, I had a client. Yes. I think it really matters for that first property as well because you are, you need that growth and B that's not going to be your forever home anyways. So it's likely that you are going to have to sell it to upgrade into something else unless you've got the borrowing capacity to kind of, to keep it. But yeah, it's even more important. I think for that first property that you really do a lot of the heavy lifting, make sure you buy a quality asset because at some point, you know, you're going to have to sell it.

Veronica Morgan: I'll be doing quite a bit of research, actually just slightly on, you know, the resale price of apartments, you know, after their first resale, after being bought brand new off the plan. But also some, you know, land and land and subdivisions can lose money between purchase and settlement as well. And that's not as heavily publicized. And so you really are starting behind the eight ball. If you you've got a cough up before in an extra 20, 30, 40, 50 grand to put towards the actual land that you've just bought, if you then need to put a house on top of that land. So, you know, this, this is these are issues that probably going to become, or have a lot more spotlight spotlight shown on them in these sort of covert era. But it's something that, yeah, it's, as I said, I've been doing a lot of research on this and it's much more alarming than I've even even realize it at the outset.

Chris Bates: Yeah. I think the problem is right now always government incentives to buy the new property you know, 5% deposits with the government kind of backing loans you know, developers, offing huge incentives. I mean there was a client that I spoke to this week, you know, trying to buy a new apartment in the gold coast and yeah, it, it, the conversation didn't go that well, really, because she wasn't really being open to understanding that there's a huge risk in terms of buying this. And just wanted to, you know, find a broker that would facilitate that transaction. And I was kind of saying what don't is the right thing for you? And the kind of the coal Conda ended, you know, and it happened a couple of weeks ago with a client who was going to buy in the Docklands. And fortunately this client, for example, really stopped and listened to what we were talking about.

Chris Bates: And I kind of said, look, you know, have you looked at other properties in Docklands? Have you looked at what happened to their resale value, et cetera. And you know, fortunately that digested and, you know, a few weeks later he's kind of emailed me and thanked me for the advice. And he just went and rented that apartment that he was, and now he's looking to buy an investment property because that's what was driving his decision. He just really wanted to live in Docklands. And they really wanted to live in this new building. It wasn't so much whether it was a good investment and I think the conversation really stopped in doing that. So, yeah, it's just something you've gotta be so concerned about. You know, when it's your first property to make sure you're not just buying it, cause you convince yourself, that's what you want when it's not a good investment.

Veronica Morgan: I have done a little bit of work, actually looking at a first time buyer that could get, get every single grant that's out there. And there are a number of them. Obviously you've got stamp duty concessions and that varies state to state. You've got first home grant that is a federal initiative, but issued state by state. And it's a different amount of money that, that is issued depending on which state you're in and what type of buyer you are. And also there's the the first home loan deposit scheme. And now you've also got this home builders incentive. Most of these pointing you to buying brand new. Most of them, the 5% home loan first home loan deposit scheme that doesn't limit you only two. And so that's sort of the best one to look at, but to use that and then buy brand new is alarming because that's where you've got the greatest risk of actual negative equity.

Veronica Morgan: But if you actually did manage to combine all of the grants, so all four grants and I looked at each state what the limits are because there's different limits for each of those grants as well, you know, in terms of thresholds. So the best off and would be if you were buying in regional Victoria, because if you got every single one of those grants in regional Victoria, your purchasing limit is 375,000, but on settlement. And this is assuming the property doesn't lose money immediately on settlement. If you put all the grants off the mortgage or even in it, in her offset account, you could end up with nearly 18% equity. So there's an argument to put forward in some locations that if you were confident that there wasn't a masses of new development to follow that you know, you might lose some money. Maybe you lose 10% for argument's sake. You still might be better off if you can do that. But there's regional Victoria. That's nearly a 17 point something percent. And in regional Queensland you could end up with about 15% equity. But that's it everywhere else. I just think there are risks, ah, outweigh the actual money that's being thrown your way by the government.

Chris Bates: And even in those scenarios, that's probably assuming the car valuation stays the same. And so you would have to be super selective in regional Victoria, because if, if, if anyone else got that idea and there was a, a bit of a flood of new properties getting built on the market, then your valuation is going to come in low and there goes your equity and

Veronica Morgan: Well, that's it, isn't it. And also if the developers are under or the developers are under pressure, they have to actually start dropping the price of subsequent lots of land. And then the valuation comes in when you go to settle. And the fact that those are being offered a lower price does impact on your valuation. So this is sort of becomes a bit of a cascading effect. And, and the other thing too, I just, the amount as these blocks get smaller and smaller, and they've all got these Colorbond fences and the house design doesn't take into account the orientation or any individual block, or how far away the fence is from the side of the house. And they got these whopping great picture windows in some rooms that are kid you not, they must be within half a meter, a big Colorbond fence. And so it's pretty ugly. Do you know what I mean? It's just like you look at it and go, Oh, how do you pressing tip? I just think that there's so little thought and it's quite alarming, but anyway, that's, that's me getting on my, on my my rant about that sort of bad design and that cookie cutter little boxes on a hillside sort of approach to developing property.

Chris Bates: And the frustrating thing is that the grants work the, you know, the liberal party is out there sort of I don't know, what's the word patting, their chests, sort of using it as advertisement to show how much, you know, demand has been interested in the home builder. And you know, the state government up there stamp duty exemption from six 50 to 800 because they know it works. And we had a client last week where you know, isn't it better for us to now buy a new, not established because we can get this additional stamp duty up to 800 rather than six 50. And you know, it was a process to say, okay, yes, you've got a little bit of a stamp duty saving, but you know, there's an opportunity cost and that's the growth on that property versus what you could buy and, you know, and that's, unfortunately what happens whenever there's something free, we feel like we should just go and get it without really thinking through what's the consequence

Veronica Morgan: True. And I do think there's a lot of data around that shows it valuations on these new properties on settlement is coming in a very high proportion of them are coming in at more than 10%, less than purchase price. And you've got to remember the you're only saving 4%, right. Or thereabouts, if you say, if you don't have to pay stamp duty. And so that's a 4% saving potentially to offset a, a loss in excess of 10%. So that's simple math doesn't add up, but it's often not you know, not factored into the conversation.

Chris Bates: Yeah. The evacuation issue is absolutely huge at the moment because of valuers of, you know, they've got nothing to really base that valuation on why would you be optimistic in a world that's being very pessimistic and we have no idea what's going to come in the next six to 12 months. So if I was a value, I'd be throwing low valuations down or the conservative side of the evaluation of a range rather than the more optimistic side. And so the problem is that's too late. You've already signed the contracts. You've gone in wishful thinking that contract's going to come in and you get to the end and you get a low valuation. And we're getting ridiculously low valuations on refinances of good property and established property where, you know, it's just you, can't, it's very hard to argue with valuers as well. A lot of people think our world or another valuation through another bank, the problem is that value will be conservative as well. And you see very few values will change their valuation unless your evidence. And to be honest as a business, now, we don't even really try, unless it's just so far off, if it's around the Mark we know the value is not going to change. So we just have to just swap banks.

Veronica Morgan: I shall give you an example of very recently, we bought a property at auction. And you know, we do very rigorous pricing research and the VA the bank Val came in 300 less than we paid. And so it was over well over $3 million, his property. So, you know, it was less than 10% of the total value, but still significant. And obviously we're quite alarmed, I think, Oh my God, you know, we looked at that valuation and we realized, and also it was a competitive auction and the next closest bid to us, there were two other people within 20 grand of where we bought it. So you know, it wasn't just us standing on our own. So when we looked at at those recent sales that the value had used, they use completely inappropriate comparables and turned out, you know, what it was, it all came down to a a key in error that when it was, the price was putting too, I think RP data or one of those might have been, been real estate.com to you.

Veronica Morgan: I'm not sure it was a keying error. It went in at the wrong sale price. It went in there to sell price $300,000 less than the actual sale price. So all the value was doing was going well, is that a fair sell price? Yep. It's a fair sale price. Then the valuation just went in at the auction result at, as he considered it to be the auction result when it was shown that that was an error, then the valuation came in $300,000 higher. So you can see, and with good reason, because the reality was that the comps were there to support easy at the price we paid. So, but that does show that, that valuation, that really what they were trying to do is to tick a box to say, is that, that auction result achievable again, fundamentally, that's what they were trying to say. And the answer of course was yes, but they didn't go and do the extra work to go. Wow. That was cheap. Yeah. So anyway, got sorted out, but not without some heartache for our clients

Chris Bates: Auction, it is an easier evaluation for a value, or I think sometimes because, you know, they know that it's sold under competitive conditions. I know that it's a, it's hard who's to say what the exact price should be anyway. They'll just go through it, the auction sale price, you know, rather than sometimes pre auction you know, and it's potentially do they have to do a little bit extra due diligence? I reckon sometimes just to think, did this, did someone just put in a really big golfer just to buy this thing pre auction? You know, if I was of value, I'd probably want to just, you know, soundcheck it a little bit more because it was, you know, potentially someone just making a big offer. Exactly.