In a year of overheated Brexit rhetoric, successful auctions have shown that buyers are still willing to buy.  Allsop completed a record-breaking year with its commercial property auctions and US-based Concierge Auctions is expanding its high-end residential offerings to London.

Allsop’s final commercial auction of the year broke a record, raising over £117.6M across two sessions on 5 and 6 December, an increase of almost 100% from the £59.8M sold at the commercial auction in December 2015.

Allsop auctioned a record £605M of commercial property this year, well above the 10-year average of £450M.

Allsop partner and auctioneer Duncan Moir (shown) called the auction a buoyant room, with strong competition in a good number of sectors. “The private investor clearly has deep pockets. There remains some price sensitivity in secondary areas, but the sale levels for better locations are very well supported.”

With 170 commercial lots sold, it was the auction house's largest December catalogue in a decade.  

The average lot size was £691k, compared to £620k to date in 2016. 39 lots sold for more than £1M either prior to or at the auction—that's 23% of the catalogue, against the 2016 average of 16%.

The largest lot to sell was a retail parade on Kentish Town Road, which sold for £4.06M from a guide price of £3.8M, reflecting a net yield of 5.3%. Other high-value lots include a town centre parade of shops, offices and flats in Reigate that sold for £3.27M; a car park in Hounslow, two miles from Heathrow Airport, that sold for £3.1M; and a freehold estate agent and office investment on London Street in Paddington that sold for £2.9M.

While the London commercial auction market has been turbo-powered in the final quarter of 2016, residential sales are gaining confidence.

Concierge Auctions will make its debut into the London market with seven central properties on 20 December. They're high-end and one-of-a-kind assets, which Concierge Auctions founder/CEO Laura Brady (above) tells us is perfect for the auction process.

Laura tells us unique properties are difficult to value, and auctions are a way for the market to appraise them. Luxury residences have not seen appreciation since the crash in 2008, but she isn't buying some experts' "the sky is falling" rhetoric. More sellers than ever are calling her, confident there are buyers for their million-pound-plus homes.