Last year as the housing market weakened, Lennar was among the first U.S. home builders to aggressively discount homes in order to move inventory; now the Miami-based company is placing another potentially trend-setting bet by testing eBay-style Internet sales in the housing market.
Online auctions for homes are on the rise nationwide, but they are typically held by desperate homeowners or banks unloading foreclosed properties, not by major builders pushing blocks of brand-new dwellings.
The experiment in Indio is proving that changing home buyers' habits isn't easy. During the set auction period, the 14 Lennar homes garnered 692 bids but not one that met undisclosed reserve prices, the minimum price Lennar deemed acceptable. Mr. Harper's $386,000 tender was the highest received for houses with list prices of up to $460,000.
» wsj.com
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