The Victorian Government has signalled significant reforms that would require vendors to publish their reserve price at least seven days before an auction.
In this week’s episode, Jarrod McCabe and Jordan Telfer explain why this rule – while well-intentioned – clashes with the commercial reality of auction campaigns, and why a published reserve rarely provides the price certainty buyers crave.
In this episode Jarrod and Jordan discuss:
- The campaign conflict: Why locking in a reserve before the critical penultimate Saturday leaves vendors pricing their assets with incomplete data
- The transparency risk: How early disclosure creates a target for pre-auction offers and opaque ‘highest and best’ scenarios
- The ‘Certainty’ Fallacy: Why knowing the reserve price offers little protection against competitive emotional bidding on the day
- A better solution: The case for vendor-funded building inspections to reduce buyer costs without distorting the auction mechanism.
