From left: 17 West 24th Street (source: PropertyShark), 325 Fifth Avenue, 15 Broad Street, 230 East 53rd Street (source: PropertyShark) and 247 West 46th Street (source: PropertyShark)

Bid on the City will auction off five Manhattan properties each worth at least $1 million May 31, and all a bidder needs is $1 to get in on the action. The Manhattan-based real estate trading platform will hold the bidding in its Time Square office for properties including a 7,800-square-foot commercial space at 17 West 24th Street with an original asking price of $9 million and a three-bedroom condominium at 325 Fifth Avenue originally listed for $3 million. The other properties are a $5 million commercial space at 230 East 53rd Street, and condo units at 15 Broad Street and 247 West 46th Street. Bid on the City previously held a $1 auction last February and most of the properties garnered final bids of less than half of the original asking price. TRD Comments

Bid on the City, a Manhattan-based online real estate auction company, is slated to launch in Miami this week, the company announced today. The company said it expects to have the site go live tomorrow. Bid on the City, which was founded in April 2009, launched in the Hamptons in January 2010 for rentals. The Miami site will feature both sales and rental listings (note: correction appended). Vlad Sapozhnikov, general manager of Bid on the City, said that he saw a specific need for this expansion. “Today’s economic climate has created a demand for a fast, efficient and transparent way to rent and sell property,” Sapozhnikov said. TRD [more]

From left: Bid on the City co-founder Vlad Sapozhnikov, Paramount Realty USA co-founder Misha Haghani and 552 West 43rd Street, where Paramount is conducting an auction

With the steady stream of distressed residential properties in New York City, foreclosure auctions have dominated recession-era headlines. But auctions at non-distressed properties have also gained prominence throughout the recession, especially among developers looking to unload remaining units in a new project.

But with many industry experts ready to tie auctioneers’ success to antsy sellers and developers, some wonder whether they can sustain momentum in a slowly stabilizing market, as auctioneers try to evade the stigma that pigeon-holes their business as a “last-ditch” approach to sales.

Misha Haghani, co-founder and a principal at real estate auction company Paramount Realty USA, said he’s optimistic that this market is a turning point for the industry, with more sellers viewing auctions as a viable sales tactic.
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From left: 88 Peconic Hill Drive and 7 Hannahs Court

Two new summer rental properties have been added to Bid on the City’s inaugural Hampton’s property auction, set for March 26. The Southampton properties, a 2,585-square-foot house with a pool and fireplace at 88 Peconic Hill Drive, and a 5,800-square-foot house with a pool and hot tub at 7 Hannahs Court, have starting bids of $60,000 and $135,000 per summer, respectively. The auction, which was originally set for March 20, will include nine other properties (click here to see slide show of the properties). The rental auction will be structured differently from the site’s Manhattan events, opting for a so-called “Dutch auction” rather than the more traditional approach. “Unlike traditional bidding in which the price goes up and bidders have an opportunity to increase their bids, the Dutch auction has incremental decreases [from a higher starting price] until the first bid comes in,” according to Bid on the City. A second Hamptons auction event, featuring 10 properties, is slated for April 9. TRD [more]

After announcing last month its Hamptons-based summer rental auction event, Bid on the City unveiled the nine homes that will go on the block March 20 (see slide show of the properties above). Each listing is a summer rental, from Memorial Day through Labor Day. The auction includes four Southampton rentals, two Hampton Bays homes, and one home in Sag Harbor, East Hampton and Water Mill, respectively. The rental auction will be structured differently from the site’s Manhattan events, opting for a so-called “Dutch auction” rather than the more traditional approach. “Unlike traditional bidding in which the price goes up and bidders have an opportunity to increase their bids, the Dutch auction has incremental decreases [from a higher starting price] until the first bid comes in,” according to Bid on the City. The priciest listing, a three-bedroom, two-bathroom waterfront home at 10 Murphy Place in Hampton Bays has a starting bid of $159,000 for the summer. The least pricey starting bid is for the other Hampton Bays listing, a five-bedroom, four-bathroom home at 70 Squiretown Road. See slide show of nine Hamptons listings above. TRD
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Yesterday’s $1 minimum Bid on the City auction event may not have gone as well as anticipated, according to Malcolm Carter who attended the event. Of the 10 properties on the auction block, fewer than half had closing bids that reached 50 percent of the properties’ last asking price, according to Curbed. One property at 147 West 142nd Street, which last had an asking price of $445,000, was auctioned for $50,000, while a unit at 175 East 102nd Street last listed for $225,000 auctioned for $110,000. And Carter said that Bid on the City representatives would often reset the auction clock when activity deteriorated, apparently in an effort to ratchet up more bids. Sellers will have 24 hours to accept or reject the final bids.

Bid on the City, the online Manhattan real estate auction site, has announced the launch of a Hamptons bidding program for rental, rather than sales, properties. The move marks Bid on the City’s first foray into rentals, and the company plans to unveil this new branch of its site with a Hamptons bidding event “on a Saturday in late February or early March,” according to a release sent yesterday. The rental auctions will be structured differently from the site’s Manhattan events, opting for a so-called “Dutch auction” rather than the more traditional approach. “Unlike traditional bidding in which the price goes up and bidders have an opportunity to increase their bids, the Dutch auction… has incremental decreases [from a higher starting price] until the first bid comes in,” a statement from the auction company explained. Once someone puts in a bid, the auction is over. Although it is not yet clear what villages in the Hamptons the site will focus on, the company said it will make information on the rental listings available 30 days prior to the auction event. Last year during this same month, brokers told The Real Deal that they were less optimistic about the coming rental season, with rental activity way down. TRD

A rezoning proposal for the Hudson Yards Western Rail Yard has cleared its final public approval hearing, according to an announcement made by Mayor Michael Bloomberg and City Council Speaker Christine Quinn. Meanwhile, real estate auction Web site Bid on the City will host its first-ever $1-minimum-bid auction Feb. 1, 2010. And, the Real Estate Board of New York has approved the membership of a new real estate firm, Exit Realty Landmark. Click here for more. [more]

Apartment 2220 at Philippe Starck-designed 15 Broad Street was up for auction through real estate auction Web site Bid on the City yesterday. But as Lower Manhattan real estate blog Downtowny reported, the property saw no bids and failed to sell. The 2,256-square-foot, three-bedroom unit is listed on Streeteasy.com for $1.75 million and was last sold in July 2006 for about $1.9 million. A number of other units in 15 Broad Street are listed on Streeteasy.com for over $1.75 million. [more]

While residential property auctions have long been associated with distressed properties, some real estate professionals are now testing them on regular apartments that are simply not selling that fast. On this week’s Webcast, The Real Deal’s Sara Polsky checks out one of the first Manhattan property auctions to provide an alternative to the normal brokerage process. Bid on the City, which operates out of a Fifth Avenue storefront, put five properties — with starting bids ranging from $299,000 to $1.13 million — on the auction block last weekend. The Real Deal spoke to all the major players at the auction and got the results. To watch the full Webcast, click on the video above.