Queensland besties seal Block finale with record profit
Billie Schwab Dunn |
The winners of television juggernaut The Block have been crowned, with a Queensland pair becoming instant millionaires.
After months of renovations, room reveals and plenty of drama, all five teams on the Nine reality television series sold their Mount Eliza homes for more than their reserves.
Queensland best friends Courtney and Sev emerged as the biggest winners in Block history, selling their House 4 property for $4.72 million and walking away with a staggering $1.27 million profit.
The result, combined with their competition winnings, brought their total haul to $1.87 million.
While every team walked away with cash in their pocket, a successful auction was far from guaranteed.
Previous seasons delivered disappointing profits and some properties remained on the market for months after the cameras stopped rolling.
This year also brought an added challenge, with all five reserve prices set at $3.45 million and publicly revealed ahead of auction day.
Under new Victorian laws, it is illegal for real estate agents to underquote a property’s reserve price in the days before an auction.
This means potential buyers have a clear idea of the price point houses are expected to reach.
“Make no mistake, The Block contestants are facing headwinds from every angle,” Domain national managing editor Alice Stolz said ahead of the finale.
“Over the past three months, while the teams have been building, house prices have been falling, recording their steepest quarterly decline on record.”
The fact that “interest rates are at a 15-year high” made things more difficult.
Stolz said the contestants had built some of the most beautiful homes in the show’s history.
“The appeal of these houses runs deep, attracting both owner-occupiers and investors, with the potential for substantial depreciation benefits and negative gearing,” she said.
The Block’s five homes each had something different to offer buyers.
Uptown, Houses 1, 2 and 3, renovated by Adam and Jolene, Chantel and Wyatt, and Lisa and Rosco, offered views across Port Phillip Bay to the city skyline, while Downtown’s Houses 4 and 5, belonging to Courtney and Sev, and Rick and Tayla, boasted larger blocks of land.
Rick and Tayla went into the auction with an added advantage after winning the week 12 prize of $50,000 off their reserve price.
The homes were previously put to the test, with thousands of potential buyers getting the chance to inspect them at the Domain Open For Inspections for the first time in three years.
“Seeing thousands of people turn out gave our contestants a huge boost and let them see firsthand how much interest there is after so much hard work,” host Scott Cam said.
“You watch these teams work their guts out to build five extraordinary homes, and we just want every couple to walk away with a life-changing result.”
AAP