need to sell bungalow before winter any advice appreciated

markymark10_2

Hi There

I'm looking to see if any of you can offer me any advice on what I should do with my bungalow.

The property is jointly owned by myself & my mum & was my mums home until she had to move into care in April following a major stroke. I cannot move into the bungalow as I already have commitments to my current residance & I have no desire to rent it out due to the refurb it would need & also because of the legalities involved with joint ownership.

I also need to sell the property as my mums savings are very low & I would like her to have use of the money invested in it to help her quality of life during her final years. There is also the issue of the mortgage which I am now paying & pressure from the council to sell the property & now the water board want to cut off the water supply as the property has been empty for 6 months.

The property is a 3 bedroom detached bungalow in need of refurb. It needs full double glazing & a new kitchen & bathroom plus fuse box & redecorating.

We put the property on the market at £126000 in May £18000 lower than the market rate & £6000 lower than one which sold in a similar condition in April.

We have have lots of interest & over 20 viewings with 3 offers being made between £115000 & £120000 however all three offers are subject to the vendors selling their houses & this is not happening.

I have now reduced the property to £112000 which makes it the cheapest in the area on rightmove but after another month we have had only one more viewing & no joy from the other vendors who made offers.

I dont want to leave the property to go through winter uninhabited & have decided that I must sell by the end of October at the latest. I am looking at 3 options.

1. Moving estate agents.

2. Placing the property up for auction.

3.Calling the quick buy merchants.

Any informed advice as to which is the best option would be greatly appreciated. Many thanks

jenny74

It's hard isn't it?

In your shoes, I would be tempted to auction it, if you really do want to sell that quickly. Bear in mind that approx 70% properties going to auction sell, obviously meaning 30% don't. You can set a reserve price if you wish.

Or you could do a Kristian Digby and have an 'Open House day'. (I jest!)

Good luck.

GDB2222

I vote for auction. the quick-buy merchants will simply buy it off you for a percentage of the auction price. Then they auction it.

Alternatively, change agents and price it at offers over £75k. You'll have plenty of offers, but no guarantee of a sale by end Oct.

Cat695

where is it? is it on rightmove??

PasturesNew

I'd choose [2] too.
[1] won't change the market
[2] gets it shifted potentially
[3] gets silly offers from spivs

teabelly

Auction is your best bet at the moment. Stick the reserve at 100k and it should go. Auctions only attract people with finance already in place so if it sells you get your money with reasonable certainty.

Have you got a rightmove link for it?

dander

If you've had a lot of interest and offers, then you must have priced it about right. Your problem is not that the property is unappealing or overpriced, it's simply that the market isn't throwing up proceedable buyers. As such, I would have thought the auction is a sensible option and you stand a reasonable chance of getting shot of it.

However, be aware that auctions aren't instant, you'll have to wait for the next one to come up and give the auction house time to get your place listed, so even with an auction, the end of October isn't tremendously likely.

gallygirl

I think you should take some advice on this from Age Concern or similar.

If you sell then her savings will be used to fund her care. My understanding is that the council can say she should sell her interest in the house but cannot force you to sell your 1/2. So you could put the house up for sale on a shared ownership basis and are likely to get no takers.

I would think again about letting the property. It was OK for your mother to live in so others would do also, and you really don't want to refurb if you intend letting. The council would take her half of the net income into account (I'm assuming she has no mortgage, if she does this would be deducted from her income). They would pay the difference and you would pay them back when mum dies, hopefully in many years and when house prices have risen.

Good luck, it's a hard time for you and I sympathise.

margaretclare

ali007 wrote: »

I think you should take some advice on this from Age Concern or similar.

If you sell then her savings will be used to fund her care. My understanding is that the council can say she should sell her interest in the house but cannot force you to sell your 1/2. So you could put the house up for sale on a shared ownership basis and are likely to get no takers.

I would think again about letting the property. It was OK for your mother to live in so others would do also, and you really don't want to refurb if you intend letting. The council would take her half of the net income into account (I'm assuming she has no mortgage, if she does this would be deducted from her income). They would pay the difference and you would pay them back when mum dies, hopefully in many years and when house prices have risen.

I disagree with this and I agree with others who have supported the 'auction' option.

'When house prices have risen'....just when is this likely to be? If ever? Many think that house prices will eventually settle at a more sensible level than the silly 'values' we've seen recently.

I don't agree with the argument that 'if it was OK for Mum to live in it will be OK for a potential tenant'. What you get used to over many years, your own home, your own things around you, your own memories, is completely different from a potential tenant coming in. Houses do not stay static. They deteriorate over time. It only takes one cracked pane and a slipped tile on the roof and the English winter will do the rest.

Also, to become a landlord is not that simple. It's not just a question of sitting back and receiving the rent. We've seen houses around here that have been turned into cannabis farms, others have been trashed by tenants, in the best case scenario it requires a lot of work keeping up with tenants' demands for repairs and improvements, because tenants have rights! What Mum accepted as normal will not be what a modern person will accept.

HTH

hethmar

Just a thought, but have you considered contacting a local housing association who have a scheme which will refurb the bungalow for you and then give you a rental contract - normally 5 years - and put their own tenants in it?

markymark10_2

Many thanks for all the advice, I will look closely at all the options.

Although I know that the council will expect Mum to pay for her care from her half of the house sale proceeds until she reaches £21000 & then a smaller contribution i'm also aware that time is running out for her in life & I know that the rest of this money would help pay for help to take her out on trips & other aids for her condition & I can also get her moved to a home closer to me. This probably wouldnt be the case if we rented as the council would just take mums half of the rent towards her care home cost so it looks like auction may be the best option.

Has anyone out there experienced these auctions or has an idea of how much the cost of selling in this way would be. I'll be doing some research of my own after the weekend but any feedback is always appreciated.