Tips for selling our flat

Doozergirl

Are your agents taking a 2% fee? Countrywide agents do, don't they?

arnie&caseysma!

mikael wrote:

Probably shows that they were also overpriced! Anyway, the market is much slower now and you can fit a very nice bathroom and kitchen into a flat for 20k. You can certainly try all you want to get 150k for it, but don't expect to find a buyer anytime soon.

Excuse me while I choke - 20K?? I would think that 5k would still be more than enough for a fitted kitchen and bathroom and all the accessories - been there and done it myself for a lot less and I have taken into account the inflation in prices since then!

diesel1974

Thanks for all the advice

I guess August is just not a good month to sell!!!

Will give it a couple more weeks then think about dropping the price maybe.

PoorDave

If you get worried about being to close to the stamp duty threshold of 125k (if you reduce your price), you could become one of those people who offers to pay the buyer's stamp duty @ 1% of sale price.

This seems very common now at slightly above the 250k 3% threshold.

Might get you more cash in the long run, though i think people would be savvy enough to assess how much this saved them.

If any buyer you find is selling at the same time, stamp duty isn't such an issue, as they can take it from proceeds of their sale, but if you're after first time buyers (who will be paying SD from their own pocket) maybe this would work in your favour.

Like i say, pictures look a tad dark, and apparently it's illegal for your agent to work some magic in photoshop or equivalent! (probably just as well...)

diesel1974

My husband & I also thought the pictures could have been better, but as we have had people coming to view we have just been hoping that someone will make an offer once they see it for real.

I suppose we are biased, we have lived here for 6 happy years!
We just expected someone to want it straight away!
We are learning all the time & won't be so naive next time we sell!

PosterBoy77

arnie&caseysma I totally agree that 5k would go along away on a kitchen and bathroom, I was just pointing out that justifying a 20k price increase over and above a flat which needs a bit of work was far too much - you could get a gold plated taps with that kind of money.

EdInvestor

One problem I think is that your Rightmove ad is surrounded by competitors which feature large amounts of foliage, greenery and even swimming pools.All very attractive in the summer.

By contrast yours rather lacks the glamour touch - the building is very plain for a start.

I would suggest you invest in a couple of large and stylish floor-standing pot plants (which will move with you, of course) to improve the greenery aspect, and also buy a blind for the kitchen window so you don't immediately see the flat opposite.

Could you also inject a bit of colour into the flat? Perhaps a cloth or runner on the table, a flowering plant or vase of flowers as a centrepiece? Some matching cushions on the sofa?

You might have a better show in the coming cooler months,when swimming pools look a bit less attractive, so I would pick a colour that is warm and welcoming.

RHemmings

If your flat sells for what you hope it will, then it will be the most expensive flat ever sold in your street. According to nethouseprices.com. Are these other flats all one beds too? Or are some of the cheaper flats two bed flats as well.

It seems like you are expecting house prices to rise, which then explains why you ask a price significantly higher than the previous ceiling price. But are prices really rising. What is happening if you look at flats in streets around yours. Are they going up, or are more recent prices a bit lower than before?