Is it definitely the price? House not moving?

macca

Hi all
House has been on the market since last July, we have had 5 viewings!!!
The house was valued at £535,000 and all of the EA's said to put it on at that as we had to be decently over the stamp duty barrier.
The last EA ditched us just before Christmas and gave us to the opposition as they closed their local office - bizarre I know. The new one is good personality wise, quite pushy and determined but she's small just 2 of them.
The property is on right move, but her first advert in the paper is very small.

I'm now starting to think I should do 1 of 2 things or maybe both! Put it to offers over £490 something to attract people who don't want to go over that 500K mark and go with a posher agent as well - perhaps people with this kind of money to spend just walk into the estate agents who mostly deal with these value houses rather than surf rightmove like me.

I do need really a price over £500 - which is what we paid as we bought some fixtures and fittings off the previous owner something we're happy to do again.

What do you think?
Ta muchly
Macca

meanmachine_2

If it's been on the market since July somebody's doing something wrong.

Although at that price you're selling to a tiny percentage of the population, unless it's the posh parts of London.

If you're comfortable posting the link - and are prepared for honest feedback, do so.

clutton_2

5 viewings in 6 months ???? - presumably no offers ?

houses do not sell for 2 reasons

there is something wrong with them
or they are too expensive


i think you should change your EA immediately, and drop your price .... when did you buy it ?

Alan_M_2

My father called this morning to tell me his neighbours house has sold and He didn't even know it was on the market.

It went on a 9am, there were 6 viewings that day and an offer was accepted by 4pm the same day.

In Dereham, Norfolk. It appears to be a sellers market there.....This was a 2 bed semi though and on at £140K.

What I've noticed in my locality (Bletchingley, Surrey) the expensive housing market is dead as dodo....what I term as normal housing..flats, 2 bed, 3 bed semis are selling with no problem whatsoever.

It may be that the housing market for £500K plus houses is just no good right now..

Further edit and purely anecdotal, I've had quite a few customers recently telling me they've decided not to move and are refurbishing/extending as the alternative is simply too expensive. The nature of my business and my location means a large proportion of direct sales I make are for properties over the £500K mark, with a reasonable number over £1 million.

And still I'm always astonished by the values of some of the properties I visit.

pboae

How about offering to pay all or half of the stamp duty? That way you still get a bit more than you would if you dropped to £500k but you might get buyers who would have been put off by it otherwise.

tigerminxy

You should be able to find out how many views of your property there have been on Rightmove. If there's been a lot of views but hardly any actual viewings as a result, then it suggests that your house is priced too high in comparison to others on Rightmove or the presentation on Rightmove (e.g. the photos) is all wrong, or both.

If you're not getting that many views on Rightmove anyway, then it might mean the market for the price of your home in your area is very slow, or that the kind of people who would buy your house are the ones who prefer an agent actually to do some work and call them, rather than just bung something on the internet.

So, if I were you, this would be my action plan:

1. Ask the estate agent for the Rightmove stats.
2. Check out the competition in your area on Rightmove.
3. Get photos and/or the description re-done.
4. Ask the estate agent to tell you how many buyers they have on their books with the right budget.
5. Ask what the estate agent has done other than stick the site up on the internet (i.e. how proactive have they been in calling up the buyers as per question 4 above).
6. Consider going multi-agency, or even switching to another agency if any of the answers to the questions above are unsatisfactory. See who's sold similar houses in your areas and just go with them. For one thing, they have a track record. For another, they'll have an idea of the real market value based on actual sales which leads onto...
7. Check the actual selling prices of houses in your area using nethouseprices or upmystreet.

macca

Thanks everyone.
Answers to your questions are as follows:
1) Rightmove stats were in the 1000,s for hits with old agent.
2) New agent is just a local one and we're her most expensive house on her books and I don't believe she has anybody on her books waiting for a house like ours, I perhaps mistakenly believed that a presence on rightmove and a pro active agent once she got a call would be enough.
3) Our house is a bit of a one off, big Victorian semi on a main road ours has been massively extended so it has 6 bedrooms upstairs and also the previous owners also bought land off the 2 neighbours so it has a massive garden - 1acre I think. Therefore difficult to compare prices as it is unique and nothing else on the road ever comes up for sale.
4) One main problem with it is that it's a semi, a Victorian semi with big thick walls and the extended part of the house is where we mainly live and that's not attached to anything but on rightmove it still says semi. When we bought it 2 1/2 years ago we were initially put off by the semi bit but once you get inside and see the space and huge garden that didn't worry us.
5) How much would you think is fair for a 2 agent agreement, my existing agent is charging 1% with no VAT? I think I've made up my mind I'm going to have to go for one at the higher end of the market.

I like the idea about paying for the stamp duty perhaps we could pay the difference going over the band would make?

Many thanks
Macca

Jim_B_3

For half a million, I'm not wanting a semi.

Doozergirl

In that price range, I wouldn't hesiatate in getting Knight Frank in on the case. You stretch the marketing boundaries much wider.

Also, if you really need to get over the SD threshold I would actually go higher with your asking! Value gets a little more subjective as value increases, and of course it depends on presentation and you need a really decent, sales focussed agent. And they should also have confidence in that value.

We managed to get Knight Frank to 1.35% + VAT, but you do need to pay for brochures, floorplans, photos and advertising on top but you get a clear breakdown before you go ahead; we didn't need brochures in the end as they sold it on the second viewing. The second time they've done that for our family

The last house they sold for us was a 6 bed Victorian Semi The photographs were just spetacular as they're taken professionally and they spend quite a while in the house. We still have the DVD!

Lesson of the day is not to pay just over SD threshold for a house, especially if you don't plan to stay long, but it's too late for you

tigerminxy

I think 1% inclusive of VAT is a pretty good rate but it makes me wonder if the agent is just so excited at having your property on their books that they're deliberately pricing themselves to make sure you stay with them.

From what you've said, I think one of your problems is that you're probably the most expensive house on your street. So either people think your house is overvalued for the area or people looking for houses like yours will not be looking on your road. For £500k+ I certainly wouldn't want to buy a house on a main road. Also, some places just aren't suited to being extended so much. I had a lovely Victorian terrace and could have expanded upwards into the loft and downwards into the cellar but because of where the house was, and the size of the garden, there was no point doing so because there was no way a family who could fill/afford that kind of place would buy it.

I don't think the fact that you've got a semi-detached house is necessarily a problem, unless you're outside London or not in a commuter town but it's probably not a desirable situation to be in to be the most expensive house in your road. Taking my own personal situation, I'm looking at a property that looks good on paper but when I look on nethouseprices.com, all the other houses on that road sold for around 10% less. It may be that this house I'm interested in is the best on that road but knowing that similar houses have sold for less makes me think I'd be better off going for something cheaper where I can add my own value.

For a £500k+ property you should sign up with people who specialise in that price range. It's like the difference between going to a car supermarket and a specialist dealer in used Jags - ostensibly the product is the same but there's just a different kind of customer going to each place.

clutton_2

have you thought about having an informal chat with Planning and asking if they would consider Planning permission for flats conversion and/or building another property in the garden >

if they say it is possible, you could perhaps consider getting PP = then you will have investors / developers as an additional possible purchaser