By Tate Papworth
The site of the former Calder Rise Primary school has sold at auction for $8.2 million, to an undisclosed purchaser.
A large crowd gathered to watch the much talked about parcel of land go under the hammer, which attracted four bidders.
Auctioneer Paul Tzamalis said the land spoke for itself.
“With all the speculation in the marketplace, to have four people compete for 20,000 square metres, just shows for good, well located land, people were always going to want to buy it,” he said.
Mr Tzamalis said it was rare for vacant parcels of land the size of the site to come up at public auction.
“I dare say via public auction you might get the chance to buy one a year, private sale maybe two a year. They just don’t come up because most of the land has already been built. It was a very rare opportunity.”
Mr Tzamalis said all walked away happy after the $8 million reserve price was met.
“The vendor took the recent dip in the market into consideration, but they had a firm view on what the value was and were happy to hold it until the right buyer came along,” he said.
“Today they exceeded their reserve price by 200,000 which showed the auction process worked, the vendors are happy and the buyers are happy as well.”
There’s no word yet on what the buyer intends to use the land for.
