Clive Emson’s success rate dipped for the first time this year at its five-day May auction.
The auctioneer sold 92 out of 122 lots at the May 5-11 auctions, a 75% success rate, which is a drop of eight percentage points on its March sale and seven points down on its February auction.
The auction raised £11m in total, compared with £20.5m in March and £16m in February.
Auctioneer James Emson downplayed the impact of the election, which fell in the middle of the auction, on investor appetite.
“All of the rooms were busy,” he said. “There will always be a market for auctions regardless of the [election] result because of the ongoing housing shortage.”
The auctions took place in St Mellion in Cornwall; Southampton in Hampshire; Brighton in Sussex; Maidstone in Kent; and Chelmsford in Essex.
Highlights included a mixed residential/commercial investment at 50-54 Grove Road, Eastbourne, that sold for £255,000 at the Sussex sale.
Let at £27,770 per annum, the property has two commercial units and a two-bedroom flat. A further commercial unit and a flat are sold on long leases, producing a ground rent of £150 per annum. It was sold to a private investor and returned a net yield of 10.8%.
In Kent, a commercial investment in Dover comprising shops and flats producing £24,960 pa sold for £246,000 to a private investor.
The flats are all let on assured shorthold tenancy agreements and the shop is let under a 20-year lease from May 2012 at a rent of £7,500 per annum.
In Cornwall a former second world war bomb shelter, located in the village of Downderry, sold for £17,500.
The seller was a Cornish property company and the buyer was an architect from the Plymouth area who intends to develop the bunker, subject to planning.
Emson added: “Demand is growing across the board, particularly for investment properties offering significant potential for capital growth and strong rental yields.”
