Anyone got experience of selling at auction?

markandjayne

Hi
have been on the market for a month or so now with not much activity (a few viewings, no interest).
We are in the Leeds area and on the market for around £450k
Thinking about other options -
Has anyone any experience or advice about selling at auction?
What sort of levels below you would get for a private sale should be expected?
Are there any sites (particularly Leeds centric) to look at to get an idea of how much houses are selling for?
What are the auction costs?
....any views much appreciated
cheers

chickmug

As an EA I feel auctions are for two scenarios.

1) 'Got to sell' regardless of the price you wil get and often the prices can be shockingly low. Like a car boot sale????

2) Or the property is unique, hard to value and you know there is definitely more than one party out there. In this situation sellers can often get far more than they were thinking.

Sorry can't help with the local information on Leeds.

JazzyJ

Most auction houses will charge you an entry/admin fee of somewhere between £300-£500 to catalogue the property, that is irrespective of whether it sells or not. If the property sells, their commission is usually around 2-2.5%. The advantage is that assuming your property sells at auction, then contracts are exchanged on the fall of the hammer, so if the buyer subsequently withdraws they will have to pay you 10% of the purchase price. However, your solictor has to put you in the position of being able to exchange on sale day, so will have to do their pre-exchange work and possibly some of their post exchange work in advance, so you would need to factor in those fees too.

How long exactly have you been on the market, what feedback have you got on the viewings so far, how many have you had, and what have the agents said about the price? If I were you, and wanting (not desperately, but keenly) to sell, I would be asking the agent for their 'forced sale' valuation. That is a price at which they would market the house if it had to sell in up to a week max. This will give you an idea of how overpriced your property may potentially be currently. It is taking an average of 11 weeks for properties to sell currently, and also the summer months are the worst time of the year to be selling too.

PasturesNew

Do you have a rightmove link so we can give better informed help/advice/opinions?

Trollfever

Some lots from the Leeds area are in this auction on Tuesday:

http://www.barnardmarcusauctions.co.uk/

markandjayne

Here goes

clearly, any interest and tips gratefully received!

lynzpower

IM really sorry to have to tell you this but it must be overpriced. Its not around 450. Its 465.

465k to live in Leeds. Im from Manchester, tbh its toppy.

westv

markandjayne wrote: »

Here goes

clearly, any interest and tips gratefully received!

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-10649472.rsp?pa_n=1&tr_t=buy

Were some of those pics taken with a wider angle lens? Pic 9 makes the bathroom look like a prison cell !

poppy10_2

You are selling for around 20x average earnings in Leeds. There are not that many people who can afford such a property, and most of them would not want to live in Leeds.

poppy10_2

Your competition:
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-20772869.rsp?pa_n=4&tr_t=buy
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-18696485.rsp?pa_n=5&tr_t=buy

While I don't think either of them look quite as nice as your property, they are a hundred grand cheaper than yours.

markandjayne

Thanks poppy and others - helpful thoughts much appreciated