A large chunk of the town's commercial precinct - seven shops - along with a three bedroom home, will all be offered at auction this Saturday with no reserve price. Photo / Supplied
First, there was the $66 island. Now there could potentially be the $1 town.
The Queensland border town of Yelarbon, population 448, may not be quite as glamorous as the Micronesian island paradise of Kosrae won by a Wollongong man following a global raffle on Thursday.
But for one savvy buyer, it might prove almost as lucrative.
A large chunk of the town's commercial precinct - seven shops - along with a three bedroom home, will all be offered at auction this Saturday with no reserve price. Which means the deceased estate could go to one lucky investor for a steal, listing agent and auctioneer Jodi Bynon said.
"At the end of the day, there's very rarely a no reserve auction, we will open it to the public for bidding and wherever it stops is what it will sell for," he said. Yelarbon sits on the Cunningham Highway just 6km from the NSW border, about half an hour's drive east of Goondiwindi.
Though there's still a pub in town and a primary school with 34 students, of the seven shopfronts being offered at auction, only one is tenanted.
Australia Post pays $346.60 per month in rent.
The previous owner, who died in 2015, bought the properties in 1989, when the possibility of a high speed rail line between Melbourne and Darwin seemed a distinct possibility.
The once-thriving rail town, has, like many regional agricultural centres, dwindled in recent years but Mr Bynon said the no reserve auction not only offered a rare opportunity for an investor but a chance to reinvigorate the town itself.
"At the end of the day, someone will be able to buy this for one 10th of what they would pay in Warwick or Toowoomba or Brisbane," he said.
"(The no reserve) was a consultation by the vendor and myself, we decided we could donate to the community something beneficial. At the end of the day, it's not about getting the maximum amount but getting the town growing again."
Mr Bynon said the unusual a step had garnered a lot of interest for the property, with potential buyers from both sides of the border making inquiries. He expects a large crowd when the three separate properties go under the hammer, on site, on Saturday morning.