Super Saturday Brings Record Breaking Results
Clearance rates continue to rise against a wealth of new listings.
By Terry Christodoulou
Mon, Mar 29, 2021 9:29am
< 1 min
< 1 min
Despite a flood of pre-Easter listings, metro clearance rates continued to sit at incredibly strong levels.
The so-called March 27 ‘super Saturday’ saw all capitals report clearance rates above 80%. Further, each capital recorded more listings than last year’s equivalent weekend, with the exception of Brisbane.
The Sydney housing market continues to soar to unprecedented heights recording a clearance of 90.4%, the city’s fourth result over 90% in the last 5 weekends.
A total of 1227 auctions were listed for Saturday, well above the previous weekend’s 856 and the Covid-impacted 1058 recorded over the same weekend last year.
Sydney’s median price for houses sold at auction on the weekend was $1,573,000, 2.3% lower than the previous weekend’s $1,610,000.
Melbourne, meanwhile, hosted 1593 home auctions on Saturday, up on the previous weekend’s 1117 and higher than the 1400 on the same weekend last year.
Despite the record number of offerings, the Victorian capital recorded its highest clearance rate since January 30 at 83.7%.
Melbourne recorded a median price of $1,015,000 for houses sold, 3.6% higher than the previous weekend’s $980.000.
Melbourne recorded a median price of $1,015,000 houses sold at auction on the weekend which was 3.6% higher than the previous weekend’s $980.000.
While ascendent year-on-year, such figures must be framed by the fact the equivalent 2020 weekend saw Sydney and Melbourne locked down due to COVID.
Brisbane, as mentioned, saw 114 homes listed for auction this past weekend, down on last year’s 131, however recorded a clearance rate of 82.3%.
MOST POPULAR
The Australian leather house has opened an immersive four-day pop-up in Manhattan, unveiling its Bloom Collection and redefining what a product launch can look like.
Following the successful launch of its Palais Collection, MAISON de SABRÉ has unveiled a new modular handbag system offering more than 720 styling combinations.
Related Stories
A five-bedroom Palo Alto home designed by Steven Ehrlich is listed for $44 million, making it the city’s most expensive listing. Built around a dramatic concrete spine, the home features four courtyards and a pool.
By E.B. Solomont
Thu, Sep 24, 2026 3 min
3 min
For years, tech entrepreneur Asher Waldfogel and his wife, Helyn MacLean, dreamed of building a modern house in Palo Alto, Calif.
The couple, however, worried about clashing with the Mediterranean-style architecture typically associated with their neighborhood of Old Palo Alto.
So they tapped architect Steven Ehrlich to create a design that paid homage to its surroundings with stucco, mahogany and titanium zinc cladding. They spent $20 million over several years building the house, completed in 2005.
Now looking to be closer to their adult daughter on the East Coast, they are putting the five-bedroom home on the market for $44 million—the most expensive listing in Palo Alto.
Waldfogel is an angel investor who co-founded Redback Networks, a telecommunications-equipment company. MacLean previously had a career in fundraising.
The couple purchased the roughly 0.4-acre site for $7.1 million in 2000 and demolished a circa-1930s Spanish Colonial home. The house they built pinwheels around a central staircase. It has 7,900 square feet of livable space, with four distinct courtyards and a pool.
A key feature of the home is a cast-in-place concrete wall, or spine, that is two stories high and about 80 feet long. “There’s a little bit of controlled chaos in what comes out of the form,” unlike a perfectly uniform surface, Waldfogel said. “If you want that, you do it in plastic.”
Waldfogel said he and his wife are thinking about the next phase of life now that their daughter is grown, although they have not decided where they will move. They also have a home in Sun Valley, Idaho.
“Right now we’re just trying to emotionally let go and decide what to do next,” he said.
Palo Alto, an epicenter of venture capital and tech startups in Silicon Valley, is home to some of the country’s biggest tech titans. Sales volume and prices are rising, with a median sale price of $3.5 million for the three months ending in August, up 5.8% year-over-year, according to real-estate brokerage Redfin.
Arthur Sharif of Sotheby’s International Realty—San Francisco Brokerage has the listing.
