Industry News

EIG October 2017 Newsletter - Essential Auction News

Publish Date: 17 October 2017

By Beth Fox

Welcome to the October newsletter:

Looking back at auction activity in September and preceding periods

I am pleased to report on a strong set of auction results, with 3,793 lots offered across 162 auctions (up 4% on September 16). The gavel fell on 2,857 lots, up almost 9% on last year, whilst total revenues exceeded £451M - up over 15% and the largest amount recorded in September since 2007.

Recent strong results have also helped push Q3 into largely positive territory, as despite a negligible fall in instructions (-1.6%) the volume of sales increased by 3% to 6,323 lots and amount raised by 11% to £1.06bn. It is certainly an encouraging start to the busy Autumn schedule, and one hopes that the market continues to gather pace.

Overall Statistics September 2017

Auctions Held in the UK 162
Total Lots Offered 3,793
Total Lots Sold 2,857
Percent Sold 75.3%
Total Realised £451,008,361

National Auction Analysis

The residential auction sector witnessed a bumper month, with lots offered up 6.7% to 3,371 lots and lots sold up 11% to 2,546 lots - the largest volume of September sales recorded since 2012. This helped push residential revenues up and over £403M; a £61M gain on last year and figures which are indicative of a competitive market with bidders seemingly not unnerved by talk of impending interest rate rises.

In the commercial sector, lots offered and sold were down 13% and 7.7% respectively on last year whilst the amount raised barely changed, however one shouldn't read too much into these figures as none of the major commercial London auction houses held an auction in September. We are simply seeing fluctuations in the volume of commercial lots offered by residential auctioneers across the regions - we'll get a much better gauge of progress next month.

A word from the editor: As ever I would welcome any comments or feedback you may have regarding the newsletter or indeed the wider market in general.

Kind regards, David Sandeman

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