Mansion Auction Saves Buyer Big Bucks

A Villanova mansion originally for sale for $7.695 million sold for more than $3 million less at an auction in April.

265 Abrahams Lane was sold to the high bidder for $4 million plus the 10 percent buyer premium for a total of $4.4 million. The auction by the New York-based Concierge Auctions took place April 22; the sale deed date was recorded by Delaware County as July 11.

The auction sale was "one of the highest sales in the relevant market in the last few years," Chad Roffers of Concierge Auctions told Radnor Patch.

The auction yielded 442 buyer inquiries, 70 showings and 5 bidders, Roffers said.

The six-bedroom, 10-bathroom house that sits on 10 acres had been on the market for about one-and-a-half years, the seller's representative Eva McKendrick, a realtor with Prudential Fox and Roach, said in April.

McKendrick said that luxury homes have stayed on the market much longer over the last five years. "It's beginning to change… but the things at the very top are going to be the last," she said. 

The auction yielded "a price that satisfied the seller and enabled the winning bidder to find the right property at a market driven price," Roffers said.