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Wishlist House was sold on January 29 in a nail-biting grand finale to the highest bidder for $505,000. Along with the $14,500 raised from the separate sale of the home’s furnishings, Wishlist is thrilled to announce it is a huge step closer to achieving its goal of significantly improving the Coast’s public eye services through the purchase of $430,000 worth of ophthalmology equipment.

Bob and Jenny Goodwin put up the sold sign at Wishlist House while auctioneer Dan Sowden of Ray White Maroochydore watches.

Dan Sowden of Ray White Maroochydore performed as auctioneer, and while the bidding was fierce, it was Jenny and Bob Goodwin who won the right to put up the "SOLD" sign!

Modelled on Wishlist's award winning "The House the Coast Built"in 2003, the project saw Ausmar Homes build a home from goods and services donated by the local community and local contractors on land provided by Stockland.

Wishlist House then went on display for three weeks in January before being auctioned to buy much needed ophthalmology equipment for the local public health service.

The entire Wishlist team is thrilled with the money raised at Sunday’s auction, and anticipate it won't be long before public eye patients on the Coast will start benefiting from a better ophthalmology service locally.

Currently Caloundra Hospital is the location for ophthalmic services on the Sunshine Coast. There are just a couple eye specialists on the Coast providing attention to cataract, glaucoma, diabetes, age related macular degeneration and ocular motility, premature baby eye care and treating some emergency eye patients. Many patients must travel to Brisbane for treatment and often find themselves on long waiting lists.

Further eye specialists are now being actively recruited and purchasing a range of opthalmology equipment will enable the ophthalmic service to further expand the range of services and care it can provide to the Sunshine Coast community.

Ausmar Homes – the home’s builders – were true partners in every sense of the word, from finding and persuading all the contractors and suppliers to donate their services to build the house, to helping out with every milestone along the way. Stockland was also on board from the start, generously discounting the price of the block at Brightwater.

With the land costs yet to be deducted, the total raised from the auction of Wishlist House leaves Wishlist with a benchmark of $62,000 still needed in order to finalise the equipment purchases. We have no doubt this balance can be raised quickly with the same big-hearted enthusiasm we have witnessed time and again from this community.

It’s not everyday you see a community rally to build a half million dollar home from donations, and we are now putting our heads together to work on raising the final amount so we can expedite the purchase of 19 pieces of ophthalmic equipment which are vital in diagnosing and treating eye disease in public Coast patients.

Thank you Sunshine Coast for sharing our vision!

Wishlist House "Handing Over Ceremony" on December 13, 2011.