More house hunters buying at auctions

More and more house hunters are looking to auctions to secure their first home, according to a company that, up to now, has mostly been dealing with distressed properties and those that are the subject of forced sales.

“Our firm has turned a significant corner, witnessing a remarkable increase in the number of private and non-distressed vendors coming to the market,” said Rob Hoban, director of Auctions at Allsop Space which sold €48m in properties at a one-day auction in Dublin last Wednesday.

“When we started Allsop, we were in the depths of recession where nothing was selling, so a lot of the properties were distressed.