Collectors, curiosity-seekers and even the mayor swarmed a mansion in Kahala to buy leftover "personal effects" of Japanese billionaire Genshiro Kawa­moto at a daylong auction Saturday.

The event was a spectacle that drew close to 1,000 registered bidders interested in about 600 items — from home furnishings to outdoor statues to a closet stacked full of marble floor tiles.

Nearly every item was sold.

Item purchase prices ranged from $25 for a ladder to $7,500 for a life-size stone lion statue.

Auctioneer Joe Teipel said the event by Oahu Auctions and Liquidations was one of a kind in Hawaii, given the number and variety of items, the seller’s notoriety and the interest.

Teipel solicited bids in a rapid-fire auctioneer’s cadence for about eight hours.

"It was a little bit difficult," he said after the auction. "It’s a gift from God. It’s what I’ve been trained to do."

Local real estate company Alexander & Baldwin Inc. arranged the auction after buying 27 mostly vacant residential lots on Kahala Avenue from Kawamoto in September for almost $100 million.

A&B is reselling the properties, only several of which have homes. The auction was arranged to liquidate personal effects left by Kawamoto, who had begun storing decorative items and displaying statues outside some of the homes he envisioned would become public gardens and art museums.

One home at 4631 Kahala Ave., where Kawamoto stored most of the decorative items and furnishings, served as the auction site.

The selling started at about 9:30 a.m. and featured a lunch wagon in the driveway and two portable toilets on what used to be a tennis court fronting the mansion.

A total haul from sales was not available after the auction. Some observers estimated the take at around $300,000.

Teipel said the items represented a "mixed bag" that was hard to value because no appraisals were made.

"It was really in the eye of the beholder," he said.

Items included lamps, sculptures, chairs, tables, mirrors, pedestals, pottery and pagodas.

Even a pair of Kawa­moto’s shoes were on display, though they didn’t appear to be up for bid.

Teipel said only two items did not receive a bid: a broken vase and a garage closet filled with maintenance supplies such as paint, a bucket of nails and jumper cables.

A pair of Indonesian teak rattan chairs sold for $300. A tiki sold for $500. A marble-topped chest sold for $1,600.

Clarence Furuya, a real estate investor, was the day’s biggest buyer, snapping up a variety of decorative furnishings, several nude statues and four lion statues, including the one sold for $7,500.

Furuya estimated he spent $50,000.

"Maybe more," he said.

Furuya said he intends to update furnishings in his Hawaii Kai home as well as some other investment properties.

Mayor Kirk Caldwell was browsing the mansion early in the day with interest to acquire a Buddha statue. It was not known if he made a successful bid.