A historic property near Arrowtown, the site of Queenstown's first market garden, will go under the hammer this weekend.
Professionals realtor Adrian Snow said the Arrowtown-Lake Hayes Rd property was notable because of the age and stone construction of its main building.
"The original construction is a stone farm building that we think dates back about 130 years and likely built from stone cut on the property.
The current home was built over the top of, and adjoining, [that] building by farmer Bernard Pinney in 1979."
During the marketing of the property Marion Patton (nee Young) introduced herself and asked to look through the property, because she grew up on the small horticultural farm which incorporated the original stone building, Mr Snow said.
"Her parents purchased the property in 1945 from the Douglas family farm and operated Queenstown's first market gardens from the property until 1967."
Mrs Patton told the Otago Daily Times the stone building had been used as a garage and to store hay for the family cow.
Her father also "built, worked on and owned" the first market garden in the area, selling vegetables and fruit grown on the property.
The present owner, Ingrid Douglas, of Dunedin, has owned the property since 1982 and uses it as a holiday home.
The three-bedroom, two-bathroom property sits on 1721sq m of land, zoned rural lifestyle, and has a rateable value of $850,000.
"I suspect the real bidding will probably start from there," Mr Snow said.
"The reason we're taking it to auction is it's very, very hard to put a value on it. It's not like we can look at other properties like it ... We'll let the market determine what it thinks its value is."
