24 March 2021

I read in the paper this morning that retired golfer Greg Norman is planning to move back to Australia, and is selling up a couple of his US properties to facilitate this.

That’s fair enough – you won’t find it as easy nowadays to zip back overseas when the lawn needs mowing, or the roses need pruning. You’re better off selling the house completely and letting someone else deal with all that.

Like others attempting the same thing, this poor retired golfer has had to take a bit of a hit on what he thought he would sell his houses for. This often happens when the need to move overtakes the need to get the best price you can for your home. We understand this – we haven’t had all the best luck on the property market either. Please accept our commiserations, Mr Norman.

But…

One house (sorry – a ‘shack’) that he sold in February in Florida was for 77 million. The one he’s taken the real hit on was in Colorado where he hoped to sell for 71 mill but had to drop the price by 19 mill to get the sale.

That’s a harsh drop. I can imagine the discussion between the agents for the seller and buyer – “He’s prepared to drop the price by 5 million”, “No – 25 million”, “counter offer he will drop price by ten million”, and so forth. Can you just imagine what the fee the estate agent will make from that sort of sale, so understandably they would fight each and every million the price dropped by.

Poor Greg.

It’s a pretty rarified world when the housing market can drop by 19 million dollars, but you still come out ahead.

Mind you – the article said that he still makes about a 39 million dollar profit on the Colorado house, which would set him up in pretty much any part of Australia.

For the right price, I’d even let him buy my house! It’s a nice house, close to the river, and there’s even a golf course within a five minute drive, which should suit him quite nicely. I’d even throw in my coffee machine if he plays his cards right. For a mere 20 million he could be calling this place home.

I might haggle a bit, though.