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The story behind realestate.com.au’s most-clicked listing of 2018

After languishing on the market for three years, a property in Victoria’s Narre Warren North sold this year with Kristen Turner of Peake Real Estate who took over the listing in April. Not only did Ms Turner secure a record price for the home, it also become the most-clicked on realestate.com.au for 2018 – finding its way in front of over 111,000 eyes on the site.

291-297 Harkaway Road sold for an undisclosed price between $8-$9 million, a massive sale for the region where the previous highest price was $2.8 million according to CoreLogic.

Ms Turner took over the listing for the grand five-bedroom home in April 2018, after it had sat with another agency for three years.

“The property was on the market for 3 years with a city-based agency – the owner and I had done business in the past, so he rang me for some local advice. I joined the campaign to sell the property in April and after an intensive negotiation, we sold the property for a record price in August,” said Ms Turner.

Kristen Turner

The home does a very good job of marketing itself, it’s a picture-perfect country retreat with remarkable touches. But Ms Turner said it took more than pretty photos to take the title for most viewed in 2018.

“I think it was a combination of strong local networking and an extremely photogenic property that got the desired result on this one! A targeted focus on local social media forums was a strategy that was consistent through our campaign implementation and the buyer for the property ended up being a local resident of the area – a sure sign that this style of marketing gets results,” she said.

The successful campaign showed how important a diverse marketing strategy is, said Ms Turner, adding that while traditional marketing still has its place she’s confident that the choice to diversify the marketing spend for this home is what sealed the deal.

Ms Turner also said that the success for the seller after such a long time showed what a good local agent can bring to a campaign. She and the team at Peake Real Estate in Berwick are firm believers that local agents bring an important level of knowledge and understanding to a listing.

The passion she and the team have for the area, and their desire to put Victoria’s south-east on the map as a quality real estate destination, is what keeps their clients happy and ensures them repeat business like 291-297 Harkaway Road, said Ms Turner.

Of course, it helps when you’re selling something remarkable.

“The home itself sold for a benchmark price, but to be fair, it was a benchmark property for the area. The owner spared nothing in the construction of the residence. Coming from the commercial building space himself, the property boasted a premium finish from front to back.

“He built it for himself and every wish was catered for – a seven-star rated environmentally conscious piece of luxury! Civil drainage ran through the entire 20 acres – thousands of trees planted. It’s an absolute credit to the owner and builder.”

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Hannah Blackiston

Hannah Blackiston was an in-house journalist with Elite Agent. She worked with the company from January 2018 to January 2019.