Allsop has broken through the £500m barrier this year as sales at its final auction of 2014 hit £77m.
The auction house has sold £520m of property this year, up by 36% on 2013, when totals were £382m.
The volume of stock sold increased by 17%, with more larger lots being sold in 2014 – £1m-plus lots increased from 102 in 2013 to 134 this year.
Auctioneer Duncan Moir said: “The last time we achieved this result was seven years ago. We have clearly had an economic recovery and property is a good barometer of that.”
The final auction of the year, which took place at The Dorchester on Park Lane, W1, on 10 December, saw 113 of 143 lots sold, including 94 in the room – an 80% success rate.
The biggest lot was the freehold ground rent of a 73,434 sq ft Asda supermarket on 4.96-acre site in Bolton, Lancashire. It was offered on behalf of a private property company and was sold prior for more than £9m to a pension fund. The sale price reflects a 3% yield.
Other highlights included the freehold of a three-storey building in Weybridge, Surrey, comprising three self-contained flats above a Lloyds bank. It was sold on behalf of a private property company to a UK-based propco for £1.7m – a 5% yield.
Moir said: “Auctions are a very public expression of what is going on in the wider market, and it was encouraging to see 300 people at the auction’s peak. Bidders are more comfortable bidding for higher value lots and vendors are more comfortable selling at auction.”
