Thirty-nine out of 41 electronic auctions of foreclosed real estate in Greece were completed on Wednesday, with a highest bidder declared – a development that apparently shows the very successful implementation of the online procedure, which has replaced traditional auctions in the country.
According to an association representing notaries in the greater Athens areas and Aegean islands, one e-auction was suspended and will be repeated, while the other was declared null and void, as no bids were submitted.
Protests, sometimes punctuated by force, and threats by anti-capitalist groups and far-left groupings often blocked such auctions at local courthouses and notaries’ offices. In turn, notaries’ associations often declared abstentions of such proceedings, which in tandem with creaky bureaucracy in Greece’s judicial sector, allowed only trickle of foreclosed property auctions to take place over the recent period.
