Real estate agent gives away a free Mercedes worth $86,000

Back in May 2020, as Auckland was coming out of lockdown, Barfoot & Thompson Millwater agent Charlie Cochrane hatched the scheme that the first 20 people to list their house with him would go in the draw for a Mercedes-Benz C200 AMG worth over $86,600.

“I thought, let’s give people a boost, they could go into a draw with a maximum of only 20 entrants. It took this length of time [to get to the 20 entries], I didn’t anticipate that long, but I’ve got some wonderful clients who wanted to do this.

“Some people have been waiting two and a half years, but it’s been fantastic,” Cochrane said.

There were conditions.

The winners, owners Ian and Debbie Upson, had sold their lifetsyle property in Roberts Road, on the Whangaparoa Peninsula, back in early 2021.

“They were so shocked and happy. All the other entrants were cheering and clapping and congratulating them. An amazing event, I’m so happy it turned out well.”

He added that end-of-year business in his patch of north Auckland, which covers Millwater to Orewa and Red Beach with houses priced from $795,000 to $2.5 million, has been good.

One of the properties that agent Charlie Cochrane sold on the cliffs above Stanmore Bay that earned the owners a $2.5m sale and the chance to win the car. Photo / Supplied

Cochrane, who drives a Mercedes E400, offered would-be vendors a chance to go into the draw only if they paid full commission and their own marketing expenses. He said he’d sold some 30-40 properties since the offer was made, but some vendors elected to do deals on commission or marketing costs rather than go in the draw, hence the time lag.

“It’s an $86,600 Mercedes-Benz C200 AMG. I paid the $4000 dealer deposit back in 2020, but it’s the latest 2022 model. I paid for it myself, out of my own money when I picked it up Tuesday. The Mercedes dealership have been very good.

“It was hard, it was a lot of money, but I’m very happy to do it as my clients are very, very excited.

“I’ve been in this business six years, it was very hard to start with, but now I get referrals and I am very blessed,” Cochrane said.

He said the last property to go in the draw, a four-bedroom house on 809sqm on the cliffs above Stanmore Bay, sold for $2.5m in September, fetching $800,000 more than what the vendors had paid for six years ago and above its CV of $2.225m.

Cochrane said he made two over-$1.4m sales in a week and had some seven or eight listings lined up to start selling in January. Last year, he sold a beachfront house on Noel Avenue, Orewa, for $3.8m after just 10 days.

“Next year will be my best ever. In this period of negativity in the real estate market, this is a little bit of a positive story.

“I’m 100% about sharing the love.”