A contemporary Drummoyne house has defied general market trends, rocketing $650,000 above reserve on Saturday before selling at auction for $5.8 million.

The four-bedroom home on a 771-square-metre allotment, at 53 Dening Street, drew five registered bidders. Three of them were active, firing off $100,000 and $200,000 knockout bids at the Ray White auction before the 2011-built home on a battle-axe block sold to a late-bidding, Drummoyne-based family.

The lower north shore and the eastern suburbs also produced upbeat auction results at the weekend, prompting some real estate agents to claim the worst was over for Sydney’s prime housing markets.

The weekend auction clearance rate was 45.1 per cent from 402 reported auctions, marginally down on the 46.2 per cent reported on the previous weekend.

The prime markets of the lower and upper north shore, the inner west and the eastern suburbs tended to produce above-market results. This was particularly the case when a property was quoted at a price point being chased by a large pool of buyers or was in one of the most desirable pockets of a suburb.

Manly continues to shine as one Sydney’s most resilient markets.

On Saturday, eight Manly properties were reported sold to the Domain Group, half of them for undisclosed prices. No pass-in results were reported in the suburb.

Toby Hutton, of Raine & Horne Manly, fielded bids from five active bidders at the sale of a one-bedroom apartment at 8/1 East Esplanade. The unit had a $745,000 reserve but sold under hot competition for $819,000.

Hutton believes the most desirable parts of Manly, particularly Eastern Hill, are performing strongly.

“There is a finite amount of properties, and there are buyers from the four points of the globe,” he said.

“I had an inquiry on the East Esplanade apartment from an expat living in Denmark, and one of the bidders was from the eastern suburbs.”

Last week, Hutton privately sold a 152-square-metre, three-bedroom apartment at 4/5 Pavilion Street, Queenscliff, for $5.7 million or nearly $38,000 a square metre.

“There are really good areas, and there are the areas that are doing it pretty tough,” he said.

“You read about clearance rates of 30 per cent around Hornsby but, thankfully, that is not where I am.

“Buyers are saying there is good value around. People who aren’t struggling to get finance have confidence in the marketplace – we have seen the correction, somewhere in the order of 5-7 per cent, and good property in the key markets is selling.”

Other strong Manly results included a dated 1920s house on a large block at 27 Addison Road. The property has subdivision potential and sold on Saturday for $3,420,000 through Cunninghams.

In the east, there was pent-up demand for a three-bedroom apartment at 1203/180 Ocean Street, Edgecliff.

The Agency’s chief auctioneer, Thomas McGlynn, fielded bids from all three of the registered bidders before selling the property to a company looking for a base for visiting executives. The $2.4 million sale price was well up on the $2 million guide price.

McGlynn said a large number of people in Sydney had held off from buying property during the market’s super cycle between 2012 and 2017.

He said their eagerness to move forward and buy had been scuttled to a degree by the bank-imposed credit crunch.

“Those people still want to buy,” he said. “It is just that they haven’t been coming forward as aggressively as they did in the past five years.”

McGrath Newtown had no trouble selling a three-bedroom house on 443 square metres at 37 Greville Street, Clovelly.

The property was contested by four families, with the auction kicking off on a $2.6 million bid and quickly going up in $50,000 bid increments. The house sold under the hammer for $2.865 million, against a $2.75 million reserve.

Selling agent Nick Simitzis said the block size and the home’s north-facing rear orientation were the key drawcards.

He noted that freestanding houses in Clovelly priced below $3 million were more heavily sought than homes at some other price points.