The Block in ‘financial disaster’ after Channel Nine ‘overpaid’ for 2023 homes

Next year’s season of The Block could prove a financial disaster for Channel Nine, a real estate expert warned.

Buyer’s attorney Frank Valentic fears the network has overpaid for a row of five houses in Melbourne’s Bayside to be renovated during the show in 2023.

A Nine company spent a total of $14.3 million on the Hampton East homes, which works out to about $2.86 million for each property.

Next year’s season of The Block could be a financial disaster for Nine, buyers attorney Frank Valentic warned. (Pictured: One of the Hampton East homes to be renovated in 2023)

That’s twice the average price for the area, where homes are worth an average of $1.55 million, reports said realestate.com.au.

Valentic said this puts producers and teams “$7 million behind the eight-ball from day dot.”

He warned that the current downturn in the real estate market favors buyers and expects The Block to focus on recouping costs through sponsorship and advertising.

Paul Sibley, the director of local real estate agency Buxton Hampton East, agreed that the show could struggle to recoup next year.

Valentic (pictured) fears the network has overpaid for a row of five houses in Melbourne’s Bayside that will be renovated during the show in 2023. Nine spent a total of $14.3 million on the homes in Hampton East, which works out to about $2.8 million for each property. That’s twice the average price for the area, where homes are worth $1.55 million on average

Sibley said the houses would have to be sold for $4 million each to make a profit.

Not a single home in East Hampton, 9 miles from Melbourne’s CBD, has sold for more than $3.1 million, a neighborhood record set in May 2021.

The classic brick homes on Charming Street were sold between June 29 and July 1 to Micjoy Pty Ltd, a company owned by Nine.

Only one of the five purchased homes along the row of houses at numbers 14, 16, 18, 20 and 22 has two bedrooms. The other four boast three to four bedrooms.

Not a single home in East Hampton, 9 miles from Melbourne’s CBD, has sold for more than $3.1 million, a neighborhood record set in May 2021. (Pictured: The Block host Scott Cam)

The size of each block ranges from 575 to 703 m².

The Block filmed the 2021 season in neighboring Hampton, just two miles from the 2023 location.

One of the block’s regulars, Denise Jacobs, said East Hampton “lighted up,” even though it was Hampton’s “poor cousin,” which tends to be more expensive.

Pictured: One of the houses on Charming Street in Hampton East bought for The Block

Jacobs, a real estate broker who sold her own home in Hampton for $1.59 million to Nine for the 2021 season, described Charming Street as “amazing.”

“It’s a happy little pocket and there are some nice established houses,” she said.

The prices that buyers paid for the Hampton homes in 2021 were between $2.3 million and $3 million.

However, prices are expected to fall near the national average, which has fallen 3.53 percent since March.

Charming Street No. 18 lounge area, soon to be renovated for The Block 2023