Rundown old boatshed fetches $61k; nine miss out

PHOTO: RAY WHITE Ten people wanted it, but Hein Van Zyl (right) was the lucky purchaser of the small Whangarei boatshed that sold under the hammer on Wednesday night. He is pictured with listing agent Charlie George of Ray White.

Everyone loves a boatshed, or so it seemed on Wednesday night, June 17, 2020, at the auction of the rundown Whangarei boatshed on the Hatea River.

Listing agent Charlie George of Ray White Whangarei says it was standing room only at the company’s new auction rooms, and there were “a whopping 10 registered bidders”.

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The boatshed sold to a local man, Hein Van Zyl, for $61,000. The purchaser is an avid boatie who will use the shed for its intended purpose.

**RAY WHITE:** The tiny boatshed for sale on the Hatea River in Whangarei (with the blue chair in the centre of this photograph) sold under the hammer for $61,000. Two staff at the Northland Regional Council worked fulltime for two weeks dealing with enquiries about resource consent for the shed.

“Interest piqued early with this listing, which received over 100 enquiries and had more than 100,000 online views,” George says. “I even received a phone call from the Northland Regional Council advising me that the listing had taken up the time of two of their staff members for an entire week as they dealt with public enquiries on the resource consent.”