Bond Wolfe is to return to the auction room for the first time in two and a half years when the Birmingham-based business holds its next property sale on Thursday 21 July.

The July auction will be held in its previous regular venue, The Holte Suite at Aston Villa FC, and will be both live for the return to the auction room and live-streamed online.

Gurpreet Bassi, chief executive of Bond Wolfe, said: “The Covid 19 pandemic hit all sectors of the UK economy like a ton of bricks in March 2020, but we were well placed to move the business wholly online with minimal disruption after our first live-streamed auction.

“However, we feel that many of our clients have missed the atmosphere of the auction room and the opportunity for networking and inter-trading that is a natural result of like-minded entrepreneurs interacting in the way they can at a physical event.

“During the pandemic, our live-streamed auctions proved to be a magnet for UK-wide and indeed a fast-growing audience of overseas investors, but we think that now is the right time to return ‘back to the auction room’.”

His confidence is based on yet another successful auction on Thursday 19 May which saw over £26 million raised in sales, with 142 lots sold from 154 offered for a success rate of 93%.

During the day 17,215 viewers logged in to watch the auction live, and in the marketing run-up to the day of the auction, there were 517,037 website page views, 139,195 video tours watched and 31,278 legal documents downloaded.

Mr Bassi added: “There is evidence from our results that demand is still outstripping supply and we had buyers logging in from across the UK and abroad.

“For sellers, we offer national coverage with lots regularly featured in areas including London, the North East, the North West and across the Midlands.

The auction got off to a racing start with the sale of six of the seven lots offered on behalf of Birmingham City Council, raising £1,865,000 in total from the sale of commercial ground rents.

The former local history centre in Essex Street, Bloxwich, which was offered on behalf of Walsall Council with a guide price* of £290,000+, sold for £610,000.

Offered on behalf of The Methodist Church Birmingham Circuit, a five-bedroom detached house at 40 Mackenzie Road, Moseley, Birmingham, sold for £632,000 from a guide price of £450,000+.

The former Newtown Health Clinic at 171 Melbourne Avenue, Birmingham, realised £700,000 when it sold prior to the sale from a guide price of £595,000+.

A strong example of the prices being offered for residential lots included 3 Farm Close, Solihull, a three-bedroom end terrace property which sold for £287,000 from a guide price of £199,000+.

The appetite for industrial property in the West Midlands is very strong at present, as evidenced by the sale of Unit 5a, Kelvin Way, West Bromwich, a freehold industrial/warehouse unit of 6,755 sq ft which was offered with a guide price of £385,000+ and sold before the auction day for £550,000.

Other hot lots included a freehold commercial investment property at 33 Alcester Road, Kings Heath, Birmingham, let to Game Nation on a new 15 year lease at an annual rent of £25,000 plus VAT, which sold for £375,000 from a guide price of £295,000.

Demonstrating Bond Wolfe’s national reach, 55 Frogmore Avenue in Hayes, Middlesex, a three-bedroom, semi-detached house offered on a guide price of £295,000+, sold for £480,000.

On the same road, another three-bedroom, semi-detached property at 77 Frogmore Avenue, sold for £481,000 from a guide price of £285,000+.

Back in Birmingham, a two-bedroom terraced house at 46 William Cook Road, Ward End, which is in need of improvement works throughout, sold for £151,000 from a guide price of £60,000+.

Gurpreet Bassi added: “This was another outstanding set of results achieved on behalf of our clients and we look forward to seeing many of them in person on Thursday 21 July.”

The Bond Wolfe auction starts at 9 am in the Holte Suite and the auction will also be live-streamed via the Bond Wolfe website with remote bidding by proxy, telephone or internet.

For more details and to register to bid visit www.bondwolfe.com/property-auctions-west-midlands/, email [email protected], or call 0121 312 1212 or 01902 928 510.