Over £3m worth of property sales were achieved at the most recent Cheffins June auction, across 20 lots.
Lots included amenity land, commercial and residential property opportunities, with the star of the sale being the landmark Bulls Dairies site on Hills Road, Cambridge, which sold for £608,000, £183,000 over its original guide price. The mixed-use building which includes a prominent commercial unit and a residential maisonette attracted fierce competition between a variety of investors, owner-occupiers and developers.
There were a number of lots which sold for well over the asking price on day, including 6.94 acres of land near Newmarket which sold for £102,000 off of a guide price of £65,000. Similarly a derelict barn in the centre of St Ives, just outside of Cambridge sold for £47,000, off of a guide price of £10,000.
Other key lots included land for sale in Guilden Morden, near Royston, which sold for £91,000 off of a guide of £40,000 and land in Caldecote, near Cambridge, which sold for £252,000 off of a guide of £165,000.
Simon Gooderham, Director, Cheffins, comments:
“Despite pre-Brexit fears, we had more people in attendance of last week’s auction than ever before. There was a real buzz in the room and some frantic bidding on many of the lots. There was an incredibly strong demand for amenity land throughout the Greater Cambridge region, in addition to fierce competition for Cambridge city centre investment opportunities. Due to the vast levels of investment into Cambridge from some of the world’s largest companies, such as Google, Amazon and Astra Zeneca, we have seen property auctions attended better than ever before. The Cambridge market appears to have the perfect storm of vast amounts of buyer-types, coupled with a lack of available stock, all of which means that prices have soared by 50 per cent in the past six years. Similarly, development opportunities are becoming ever-harder to find and are therefore achieving ever higher prices.”
Commercial and mixed-use lots were particularly successful throughout the region, offering yields up to around 15 per cent, along with healthy capital growth. For example, one of the lots at auction was a 1,222 sqm industrial building with two storey offices and a parking area, about ten miles from Cambridge, which sold for £500,000.
Last year, Cheffins had a record-breaking twelve months with £13m worth of sales throughout the year.
