House price expectations...

girl_withno_name

Looking for people's thoughts on the following:
Are EAs / vendors unrealistic or is the market moving upwards?

Bit of background - I'm a FTB and we've been viewing houses over the last 4-6 weeks (having now viewed about 20-25 properties)... and during that time we've found a couple of places that we like, but we've felt the vendors and EAs to be somewhat 'optimistic' in their pricing.

One property was bought for £115k about 18 months ago, marketed for £130k... some cosmetic work, such as new carpets upstairs, tiles in bathroom.

Another property was bought for £145k about 2 years ago, marketed for £155k... again, new carpets but not much else (also sold for £160k in 2007 so the current price is closer to that than the more recent one!)

Am I missing something? Surely new carpets doesn't add that much value to a property? And the market still seems quite flat...

richardw

girl_withno_name wrote: »

... And the market still seems quite flat...

or is the market in your area rising or likely to fall?

Sampong

Without knowing the area, or the properties - it does seem the EA's and Vendors are optimistic. Both sound like would-be property developers, but Carpets don't add 10k to a property value.

At least you know what to tell the EA's when they phone chasing you. "The price is unrealistic".

girl_withno_name

richardw wrote: »

or is the market in your area rising or likely to fall?

I'm not sure - anyway I can figure this out? (I'm in South Wales)

Better_Days

There is definitely a proportion of the market around here (East Anglia) which is unrealistic about price. There seems to be 2 main factors - vendors thinking their property is worth what it was in 2007 (and in possible negative equity) and EA's overvaluing to get business.

There are 2 corporate EA's in this area who over value to get business. Price reductions on RM, and 'most reduced' on Zoopla show these 2 agents up. These 2 agents are also 2 of the most expensive, one charging 2.5% on the marketing price before any reductions.

We have looked at a few which are overvalued. Some have reduced (and sold), some have taken the property off the market, and some just stay on the market for years.

Despite all the EA hype, I think the market is fairly flat round here.