Advice For Buying Property at Auction (written by the least qualified people to give it)

As most of you will know, Cal accidentally bought our house at auction.

If you haven’t heard this story, and are wondering HOW you accidentally buy a house at auction, you can read about the mishap by clicking HERE.

Admittedly, we are about the two least qualified people to solicit advise about buying property at auction. But, as first-time buyers and bidders, we learnt a lot from the experience, and my hope is that someone else can learn from our mistake!
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So we’ll start with some important advice, and then let you know a bit about the process of buying a house at auction!

What in the world have Cal and Claire bought!?

​Firstly, and I can not stress this enough: DO YOUR RESEARCH ON THE PROPERTY YOU WANT TO BUY!
 
To be fair, Cal and I had done LOTS of research on the apartment we wanted to buy!

- We scoured the internet for information on the property.
- We attempted a site visit (which couldn’t be done because of a closing order on the unit.)
- We used a friends drone to check out the roof and upper floors of the building.
- And we spoke to people in the neighbourhood to find out as much as we could about the property.

From our experience, people love a good gossip, and you can learn some valuable information about a property just by asking around. But take what you have heard with a pinch of salt, because you are bound to come by some nonsense mixed between the useful information.

From speaking to people about Jameswood, we were convinced our building was sinking and needed costly underpinning (which was definitely not true: we had a structural engineer do a full investigation on the foundations, and they were solid!) We heard crazy rumours that a river ran underneath our house (also very much not true,) and even a woman from the council advised us that the gable end of the house could collapse any day now (This was the most confusing information we heard. The gables were over half a meter thick, dead straight and solid. It would take a catastrophic event to move those walls).

But we also learned some very useful information about the place: why and when it was abandoned. The need for a costly roof repair coincided with the American Navel troops leaving Sandbank – essentially halving the population overnight. Joint ownership complicated the matters, as one tenant had left for America, one had recently passed away, and another was elderly and chose to move in with family. The only tenants left in the building were a young couple who couldn’t afford to cover the cost of expensive common repairs that should have been a shared responsibility between all owners. The couple put a bathtub in the middle of the upstairs living room to catch leaks, but eventually gave in and abandoned the building.

From this information, we decided to look back at the sales history of the property. The units had never been sold at the same time, making joint ownership difficulties the main culprit for the property being left undeveloped. 
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A quick site visit to Jameswood would have raised red flags in a matter of seconds. The wall looks as if it would fall at any moment, and unboarded windows means there is almost defintely severe water damage.

​My second piece of advice is implied by, and just as important as the first: DO NOT BLIND BID AT AN AUCTION!

You will be tempted to blind bid. Especially if the property you were hoping for is snatched up by someone else. But beware: auctioneers use VERY sneaky marketing tactics.

Take Jameswood for example. The photo of Jameswood that the auction house used was taken in 2010 – eight years before the auction. It was conveniently angled to hide the partially collapsed bay window and front wall that would have been an easy red flag to any buyers. The description of Jameswood said the building was perfect for development, needing “upgrades throughout”; which in our opinion, doesn’t accurately describe a building that is in partial collapse, needs seriously structural repairs, and requires a new roof and full gut due to extensive water damage. The council and our structural engineer both told us (repeatedly) to knock the building down and start over; the building was definitely not perfect for development.

If you’re wondering WHY we didn’t just knock the building down and start over, you can click HERE to find out!

The photo of Jameswood used by the auction house. It very conveniently hides the collapsing wall. The 8 year old photo does not show the overgrown state of the property.

We weren’t the only ones who thought Jameswood was improperly marketed! Rumour has it that the previous owners of the building had brought the Auction house to court, accusing them of false advertising. But auction houses are protected by the law and know all the loopholes available for them to legally advertise a property.

These cheap, cunningly marketed buildings become a cash cow for auctioneers. People buy a property on a whim, realise they’ve made a bad purchase, and quickly sell it on at the next auction. Each time this happens, an auction house collects a sellers fee, and a buyers fee, usually upwards of 2000 pounds each; and the cycle continues.

This happened with Jameswood. The property was passed on between buyers like a game of hot potato for at least 10 years. Each time, making the auction house upward of four grand.
At the auction Cal went to, another of the four apartments in the building was sold to a blind bidder from Glasgow. When he first did a site visit, he immediately called us, offering to sell his apartment – eventually giving it to us at a loss.
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Once we had purchased the unit off the Glasgow man, we owned three of the four units in Jameswood Villa.

When the last apartment was advertised at the next auction, it was clear the auction house didn’t want us to buy the unit and end the hot potato unless they could swindle us for some extra cash. They offered to sell us the property before the auction at a crazy price, and when we said we would just wait for the auction, they told us there was another interested buyer. We called their bluff, so they lied to us and said the property had been sold – even putting a sold sign on their website so that we wouldn’t turn up for the auction!

We had no idea the property went to auction, but found out a month later that it had been bought by another blind bidder. The cycle continued!

The couple who won the bid only realised how bad the house was when their solicitor stumbled upon our blog! Having seen that we had a plan for the place, and not wanting the auction house to make any more money off their Jameswood scam, they sold their apartment to us at a loss. ​

A bit more than upgrades throughout.

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I will clarify for Cal’s sake, that he didn’t purposely blind bid at auction. He had genuinely thought he was bidding on a different property. Whether on purpose, or bad luck, two extra apartments at Jameswood had been added to the auction last minute, and had not been included in the printed auction booklets. Having little experience with quick talking auctioneers or a Glaswegian accent, Cal chose to carefully follow the auction book, and had no idea he had bought the wrong house.
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Though this should go without saying, my last bit of advice is to be very careful and pay close attention to which plot is being sold at the auction!
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Only one unit from Jameswood was included in the auction booklet. When it was successfully bid on by a Glasgow man, Cal thought he was bidding on this apartment in Glasgow.

​We were first time buyers when won the bid for Jameswood Villa. The process for buying a property was completely foreign to us.

The biggest surprise for me was the hidden cost included in buying a property. We expected to pay auction fees, but I naively thought we could transfer our money to the Auction house and be handed over our keys! (I had no idea there wouldn’t be any keys to the house… there weren’t even locking doors left!)

I’m still not exactly sure what they do, why they’re needed, or why they are so expensive, but a solicitor is needed to buy a property. Then, if the price of your property is over a certain threshold, you'll have to pay taxes as well. Luckily, Jameswood’s apartments didn’t meet this threshold!

After one stressful month of compiling paperwork for our solicitor, we received a slightly anticlimactic email from the lawyer to confirm that Jameswood was now ours. We sat in our leaky, rotten house, with a bottle of beer and a deep determination to turn Jameswood into a beautiful home. 
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And with the help from great friends, we cracked on with turning Jameswood into a beautiful home.

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All in all, I think the outcome of an auction is what you make of it. On paper, and according to the professionals, Jameswood was a dud. But we think accidentally buying our Victorian Villa was one of the luckiest mistakes we’ve ever made!

Jameswood has given us a goal. It’s given us a challenge that Cal and I can work on and grow from together. We have learned so much about ourselves and each other. It’s been difficult, both emotionally and physically, but it’s made us stronger and we’ve had some of our best memories while restoring this building.

I hope our story has not only taught someone about the dangers of buying a property at auction, but also taught someone about the good that can come from taking a risk and determinedly following your dreams.

Thank you for joining us on our journey as we attempt to restore Jameswood Villa.

If you would like to help us get a little bit closer to reaching our goal, you can visit gofundme.com/f/whathavewedunoon 
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Still smiling after accidentally buying our house.