LAKE OSWEGO – A Lake Oswego home builder who built more homes than he could sell in the traditional way sold 141 homes during the past weekend’s home auction at the Oregon Convention Center.

The Buena Vista Custom Homes sales generated a total of $65 million in sales, which is believed to be the largest sales event in Oregon real estate history, as well as the largest real estate auction by a single seller.

Background: Read more about why the builder resorted to an auction

The event drew 2,209 attendees who bid on the 240 homes offered in the auction.

The owner of Buena Vista Custom Homes, Roger Pollock, announced prior to the auction his intent to use the event to sell the company’s inventory of completed homes. Prior to the event there was much speculation about the “reserve prices” which are standard in a real state auction. Buena Vista set their reserve prices to mirror their costs. Ninety six percent of the homes sold were sold under the “reserve” price.

“We came to the auction to sell, and we did just that. To sell 141 homes in less than 48 hours is truly remarkable, said Pollock.

Homes offered at auction ranged from 1,113 to 5,073 square feet and were located in some of the areas of highest demand around the Portland metropolitan area.

Additionally, 29 homes were also included from the Bend, Oregon market. Homes sold from as low as $195,000 for a 3 bedroom 2 and a half bath home in Sandy, Oregon to $510,000 for a 5,073 4 bedroom 3 bath home in the Shadow Ridge subdivision in Happy Valley, Oregon. Virtually all areas were strong sellers with two exceptions, the homes being offered in Bend and Buena Vista’s portfolio of rental homes. None of the homes in Bend sold and few of the rentals found buyers.

The company’s move to enlist their entire standing inventory in the auction was an aggressive move, but reduction in inventory will allow Buena Vista to become a land buyer again, taking advantage of dropping prices for build-able lots.

Pollock was initially cautious about what type of message an auction would send, but asked himself, “Did we overbuild?”, and after answering “Yes”, he quickly decided that it would be an innovative sales strategy to move out the overbuilt inventory.

The company now plans to move to a much more conservative model of offering few finished homes, built on speculation of future sale and more pre-sold to buyers.

“We will still be an aggressive player in our market. The sale of the homes from the auction puts us in a great position as a buyer. There are some great deals to be had out there right now on lots,” added Pollock.

Buena Vista will donate over $250,000 from the event to area charities as part of Pollock’s “Profit Partners” program. The program donates a portion of each home sold, regardless of price, to 19 area charities.