The 5 biggest shocks of The Block 2023 auctions
Season 19 has been a spicy one. A couple of plot twists early in the season quickly paled into insignificance, completely outstripped and overtaken by the chaos and drama of the contestants.
These auctions were never going to be benign.
Sitting through an auction is usually a very nerve-racking experience for most, but The Block 2023 Hampton East auctions? We’ve got whiplash.
Steph and Gian’s entire auction
Fan favourites Steph and Gian came out as clear winners on auction day but watching the event unfold was absolutely wild.
The speed of it was breakneck. Within milliseconds of the auction starting, Danny Wallis jumped in with a bid of $3,999,999.99, and auctioneer Tom Panos declared the property was on the market. In the first bid, Steph and Gian made a $649,999.99 profit.
Before everyone has even had a chance to stop gasping in disbelief, Panos called the property once, twice – and then buyer’s advocate Frank Valentic put in a bid of $4 million.
Cue more gasping until someone in the crowd yelled out, “Stop, there’s something wrong,” and the cameras panned to one of the bidders, who had collapsed.
The auction paused as Dave “Hughsey” Hughes and other bidders rushed to the woman’s aid. Producers called 000 and the crowd was cleared from the deck.
An ambulance arrived and a medical team attended to the woman – who intended on buying one of the houses – and the auction remained stalled until she was eventually well enough to be walked out.
When the auction crowd returned, they were hushed and looked slightly shell-shocked. The $4 million bid was with Frank Valentic. The auction was called once, twice, and the final call was made.
Then: “$5 million”.
Adrian Portelli – a prominent investor known as “Mr Lambo” and a serial Block bidder – had raised the bidding by a crushing $1 million in one fell swoop. There was more gasping from the crowd, jaws on the floor from contestants, and tears and laughter from Steph and Gian.
The auction was done and dusted in three bids. Sold, for $5 million, to Adrian Portelli. Steph and Gian had made the biggest profit in 20 years of The Block – $1.65 million.
Adrian Portelli bidding against himself
Serial Block bidder Adrian Portelli wasn’t taking any chances this year. There were some houses he wanted – at what appeared to be any cost – and luckily for Eliza and Liberty, their House 5 was on his hit list.
His first bid of $4.1 million came swiftly after Danny Wallis’ opening bid of $3,099,999.99.
It chalked up an immediate (and massive) profit of $850,000 for Eliza and Liberty.
But why stop bidding if you’re having fun? Portelli bizarrely bid against himself, unprompted, raising the price by a whopping $100,000 to $4.2 million.
The others were done; Frank Valentic said he was out and Danny Wallis said, “He can have it,” but Portelli bid against himself again, calling out $4.3 million.
Auctioneer Nick Renna of Jellis Craig laughed and said to the crowd: “This is the strangest auction I’ve ever done in years.”
That’s an achievement in itself.
The hammer fell and the property sold for $4.3 million after only four bids – three of which were made by Adrian Portelli, and two of which were made against …. himself.
Danny goes home empty-handed and seething
Melbourne philanthropist Danny Wallis made his first appearance on The Block in 2012, buying Mike and Andrew South’s house in his signature bidding style for $1,400,001.01, and since then he’s been a standard fixture on auction day.
He’s forked out millions of dollars on The Block properties over the years, and the properties he buys are often rented out or used for charitable purposes. Last year he handed Omar and Oz a history-making profit when he bought their Gisborne home for $5,666,666.66 – a whopping $1,586,666.66 over the property’s reserve of $4.08 million.
But this year he couldn’t catch a break. He was completely outbid by Adrian Portelli in House 4 and 5 and then he made just one single bid for House 3.
He opened the bidding for Kyle and Leslie‘s House 1 but before he could even finish reading his bid aloud he was cut off by Adrian Portelli who outbid him (again).
He countered with a second bid, but was again swiftly outbid by Portelli, who looked on a mission to secure his third property of the day.
Looking frustrated by this point, Wallis refused to participate in the auction again and didn’t make a single bid for Leah and Ash’s House 4.
He remarked to reporters on his way out that House 4 and 5 sold for “too much” and when asked why he didn’t push harder to win Houses 1, 2 or 3, he told Domain: “They’re junk.”
His sister, who’s stood next to him at every Block auction, wrangling his dog, added: “[They’re] high maintenance for investment properties, which is what we have to consider.”
Maybe next year.
House 3’s shock $65,000 profit
After the huge numbers that were shelled out for House 4 and 5, all eyes were on Brett and Kristy as they walked in to watch their auction unfold. Expectations were high and the literal million-dollar question was: Can this momentum be sustained?
But it was different from the very first bid. Danny Wallis did not open with a $3 million-plus figure. The first bid was $2.75 million – $220,000 shy of the $2.97 million reserve.
It turned out to be a two-horse race between buyer’s agent Frank Valentic and buyer’s advocate Marty Fox snr of White Fox Real Estate. What played out was far more like a normal auction experience – the pair duked it out in small(er) increments, then it stalled, then started again, then stalled, then started again. It was by far the longest and most tense of the auctions.
The hammer fell at $3.035 million, netting Kristy and Brett a profit of just $65,000.
Kristy later blamed her agent for the tepid auction, telling reporters he had “shit the bed” and changed strategy.
“He pretty much revealed what our reserve was to the auction [crowd],” she said.
What her agent, Sam Inan of Belle St Kilda, had, in fact, revealed was that house was on the market – but only after Fox bid $2.97 million and Valentic then asked, “Are we on the market?”
Inan told Domain afterwards that his hands were tied.
“With Consumer Affairs [Victoria] in attendance it’s very hard not to answer truthfully,” he said. “You can sometimes say, ‘Look I’ll answer you when I’m ready.’ But the reality is, with Consumer Affairs there – and they’re knowing what the paperwork says – it’s very, very hard to do anything but tell the truth.
“They actually followed me around during the break and said, ‘You’d better make sure you reiterate that it’s on the market – I don’t think everyone heard you.’ ”
He said the disappointing results for Houses 1, 2 and 3 were not a direct consequence of his calling House 3 on the market.
“When I spoke to some of the buyers that didn’t bid on our properties they said they didn’t see the value in our homes, full stop,” he said.
“It had nothing to do with whether they were cheap or affordable on the day. They just didn’t like them.”
Leah and Ash have yet to sell their house
The Brisbane couple from House 2 are serial renovators but their house-flipping experience wasn’t enough to get them over the line on auction day.
Their auction was short and sharp – it stalled after one single opening bid of $2.9 million.
Their agents, Halli Moore and Noel Susay of Buxton Hampton East, took a break to confer with the couple, who decided to pass the property in.
They told Domain afterwards they had seen how the previous two auctions played out and, given they were still $70,000 short of their $2.97 million reserve, couldn’t risk the house selling without netting them any profit at all.
“As soon as we saw that there was a $2.9 [million] bid out, it felt really slow. You can see it in Danny’s face and you can also see it in Adrian’s face when they lose complete interest. And I sort of straight away knew,” Leah said.
Their sole bidder, Frank Valentic, had first rights to negotiate with them after the auction passed in. No deal had been inked as of Sunday.
We recommend
We thought you might like
States
Capital Cities
Capital Cities - Rentals
Popular Areas
Allhomes
More
