WHY ARE HOUSE PRICES STILL BEING MISQUOTED â€" (Part One)

I have been trying to buy a house now for six months and I am at the point of â€~throwing in the towel’. You real estate agents are winning. I have invested so much time and money into my search for a home in my price range only to watch the properties I hoped to buy to sell for far more. I cannot afford a house at the price I have budgeted.

For some reason when I go online or telephone for the price of a property, which looks just perfect, I never seem to find out the TRUE price of the property. I have been to so many auctions only to find that the property I was quoted at $436.000 is passed in at $509,000, or even more unsettling, is sold to the highest bidder for sometimes up to 70% more than the quoted price. Would someone please tell me why this is so?

This had me searching very seriously and I came up with two sites with which I felt quite comfortable. Hockingstuart.com.au has a privacy statement on their online website, which explains that they will â€~comply with Local, State or Federal legislation or regulations with respect to Real Estate property sales, rental, and administration.’ This made me look further and OzFreeOnline.com has a Real Estate Forum where I found some great information from other homebuyers like me. The real estate pages have thousands of ads and all you need do is register, login and search until you find the property you want to buy anywhere in Australia. Furthermore, you can advertise your own property in their pages free.

I have heard it said by many leading real estate agents that the frustration of homebuyers with regards to misquoted auction prices is causing concern and damaging the industry's reputation. That may be so, but where does it leave the obstructed homebuyer? Unfortunately, many agents continue to defy the Victorian State Government's auction laws, selling properties for far above their advertised prices. Personally, I have had properties underestimated at 20% to 26%, only to find that by the day of auction the starting price was the advertised price and sold well over the underestimated price by 50% to 70%.

One auction I felt very confident about, after having talked to the agent on three separate occasions, had me standing open mouthed, as the property priced at $375,000 sold for $575,500.