Forget fluid buying and selling this spring, the peak property season is requiring more forethought than ever.

With buyers less enthusiastic, homeowners need to wow them to achieve outcomes. Sellers need agents who work with buyers as part of their practice. And buyers want a new level of service, with the legwork done for them.

The days of ‘post it online and they will come’ have changed.

We only see results when these new dynamics come together. Take this terrace in Gordon St Paddington, which sold in less than a week. With registered buyers looking in premium price brackets, it sold ‘off market’ for $5.25 million.

Those who missed previous auctions in the Colgate Palmolive building turned out to see this Balmain icon. Going all the way to auction for $2.51 million, it sold to buyers who inspected BresicWhitney’s previous sale there in June.

The BresicWhitney year-to-date clearance rate is 56% compared to the wider Sydney figure of 53%.

Sales activity was strongest in the city around Darlinghurst, Surry Hills, Glebe, Redfern, as well as on the Balmain Peninsula.

Everything seems to be lagging a few weeks in the rental calendar this year, so it’s hard to gauge if spring is livening things up. It remained slow going into school holidays, but we’re monitoring activity for any end-of-year upswing.