House selling advice - pretty please

miss-sixty_2

Sometime in the next 12 months (hopefully sooner rather than later), we'll be putting our flat up for sale.

The flat is privately owned, but it is on a housing association estate. I think it's something like 1 or 2 in every block of 6 that is private. It isn't a particularly rough area, but we do have the odd problem with local teenagers. They don't mean any harm, but they get bored. It generally means a bit of graffiti, litter etc, but it does all get cleaned up pretty quick. So the general area doesn't look too bad.

However, the flat was built in 1979, and, to the best of my knowledge hasn't been updated a great deal. The decor is fine, we spruced it up a lot, as did the girl who lived here previously. But things like the boiler worry me. The heating works fine, but the boiler really is well overdue its replacement date. The hot water doesn't really get hot though, but, although it bugs me big time, its not something that will stop a sale.

My biggest concern is the bathroom. As I'm sure you know, most flats have bathrooms with very little ventilation, and ours is no different. It's in the middle of the flat, so no window, although there is an extractor fan, and it also backs on to the airing cupboard. So. due to the humidity there's a damp problem. This has got worse over our 3 years here and we should've done more about it as we saw it happening. There's a small leak from the corner of the shower screen, which has made a corner of the room very wet (beyond damp). Also, the toilet cistern leaks from the handle. We've tried to fix this with little success. It's made worse by the constant condensation on the cistern. Fortunately(?) the leaks are all in the same place, so most of the bathroom is okay. But, due to the humid atmosphere in there, mold grows at an incredible rate. No sooner have I scrubbed it all, than it's back again!

We had the flat valued in the spring, and the surveyor said we didn't need to do anything, but the bathroom problem really worries me, and has got worse over the exceptionally hot summer.

Basically, I feel that the bathroom and kitchen need completely replacing, as does the boiler. I think the bathroom *has* to be done for us to sell the place, whereas the kitchen and boiler would just knock down the value, but I'm not sure (although it is unusual to have a GCH flat, so that might go in our favour).

I don't really know how much any of it will cost as we've always said it's not worth doing work like that as we wouldn't recoup it. We don't want to price it out of its area.

Any advice?

courtjester

You could market the property with a degree of honesty stating "bathroom and kitchen require updating" - this way you head off potential problems with people being surprised with the state of these areas at the time of viewing and also place buyers on notice that the asking price already allows for the condition of the property at the present time.

Assuming of course that your valuation DOES allow for this condition compared with the prices of similar, but updated, flats nearby.

Doozergirl

The 'surveyor' that valued your house is probably just an estate agent and they always tell you not to bother doing anything because they don't want to offend people.

I would think that to put in a new, decent extractor fan wouldn't cost the earth and it would make a great deal of difference to the flat. The survey is virtually guaranteed to pull up high moisture readings and you need to avoid this happening. Change your shower screen for a curtain right now. Shower screens are just awful and it's easy to buy a shower curtain and pole for next to nothing that doesn't even need a screwdriver to fix up.

Constant wetness will eventually cause either wet or dry rot and this is a massive problem. You need to stop the water spilling out.

Kitchens can be upgraded by just painting the doors in a light colour and maybe replacing worktops, sinks and taps. Some tasteful, fresh lino will brighten the room and costs next to nothing.

The effect won't last forever, so I'd only do it just before you got to the market.

miss-sixty_2

Thanks for the tips

Shower curtains give me the heebie jeebies! I've never heard anyone recommend them over a screen before. Will look into getting an easy to put up one though

I painted the kitchen cupboards (and tiles) a couple of years ago, so I know how it doesn't last! But, like you say, there's no reason why it can't be done again

The 'surveyor' was surveyor, and he did have a couple of suggestions, but nothing major. Mainly just to declutter, (which did offend me, as we are FAR from cluttered!) and to paint the fitted wardrobes, as it's a job I started but didn't finish