Even Selling Houses Australia's Andrew Winter-renos didn't turn the tide on Rapid Creek, Darwin apartment offering
The three bedroom Rapid Creek apartment of the boilermaker Robert Crispe featured in the last series of the LifeStyle Channel's Selling Houses Australia has been sold to an owner-occupier.
It was after four on-off marketing campaigns over the previous two years all the while the data and the headlines suggesting Darwin was the best price performing capital city in the country.
The then vast, empty penthouse apartment had been on the market since late 2010 with its pre-Selling Houses Australia makeover asking price falling from its lofty $790,000 despite Darwin being in the midst of a property boom.
It's been recently sold for a respectable $660,000, several months after the show put the apartment to late 2012 auction.
Due North
It last sold at $275,000 in 2003, thereby reflecting 8% annual price growth. Latest research from RP Data shows over the past decade Darwin's house and unit prices have increased 10% per annum.
Its $1700 a quarter body corporate rates wouldn't have helped secure a sale.
The suburb's median unit price sits at $431,500, up 13% on the year and 37% over the past five years, according to RP Data.
The presenter Andrew Winter initially said the penthouse was a 1970s time capsule before its five days of renovations.
Andrew Winter's Selling Houses Australia described the Darwin apartment offering on its initial appearance as like a remand centre with the roofed terrace of a prison exercise yard.
But it attracted no bids at the filmed auction and was then listed with a $699,000 asking price through Shun Hatton at O'Donoghues First National.
The 151-square-metre, three-bedroom, two-bathroom 1979-built unit was being marketed as having "wow factor".
Located close to amenities including beaches, quality schools, university and transport, O'Donoghues's property managers estimated prior to its sale to an owner occupier that the potential rental was $850 plus per week furnished.
The Rapid Creek block's most recent sale was $388,000 for a two bedroom 74 square metre unit which was listed late last year with a $420,000 plus asking price. It was put up for rent at a $480 a week asking rent, which has since been reduced to a $430 a week asking rent, reflecting a 5.7% yield.
The prior sale in the block was in 2011 at $350,000 for a two-bedroom, one-bathroom 74-square-metre garden unit, which was recently available at a $430 a week asking price lease. Its rental in 2002 was $170 a week.