housenetwork - a review

not_loaded

If you feel the service is poor then you probably need to move on. You should bear in mind the very low price compared with the High Street. Did you pay all up front?

I’ve never been very interested in feedback. If they want to buy your property they’ll say so loud and clear. If they don’t – who cares?

Are you sure the High Street EA at what? ten times the price or more will be better?

I hope it works out for you whatever your decision.

SheppyD

I sort of agree with the feedback. Most is total rubbish and just makes me angry.

I also think that no estate agent can talk you in to buying a property. We recently bought one and saw many that we just didnt feel were right. So annoying to have to explain why you dont want that house and then have 100 stupid reasons thrown back at you as to why what you believe is not the case.

Having said that - not having any viewings with HN atm!

a_gwtw

We've been with HN for over a month and only got 1 viewing, which is a bit disappointing given the properties in our areas seem to sell quite quickly...

We haven't tried any of the tactics raised by others in this forum, as we're in no rush to move yet, but we started wondering whether HN's approach seems to be a bit inactive as some people have mentioned here...

WallyBird

not_loaded wrote: »

When I said ‘no serious problems’, that refers to the one-time mistake of our account manager taking us off the market too early. I’d been assured that we would remain on the market until we requested not to be, and somebody ‘automatically’ took us off immediately on offer acceptance.

How odd - the same thing happened to us! It did have unfortunate consequences too - a potential buyer was told the house was sold to someone else, when those people had not sold their house and we had made it clear we did not want our house off the market until it was definite. We know this because once it was back on market the buyer tried again and did eventually buy it, and he told us he had tried before two weeks earlier and been told it was already sold.

Unfortunately, during those two weeks we lost a house we had been trying to buy - offer accepted and everything. Someone else got in ahead of us, so that was that. The seller was a nice person and did not want to change her mind once she had said yes to the others (she had waited a while for us, so it was not her fault). But I do think HN lost us that house. Luckily we found another - different if not better - and the rest of the sale was fine.

Moral seems to be to make it very clear that the house stays on the market and keep checking. In our case, the misinformation was given by phone though, so no way we could have known if the purchaser had not told us.

WallyBird

Sorry to hear your experience Pilotj. By contrast, I found communicating with HN pretty easy, and the person who took our photos was excellent - polite, efficient, and did a good job. I wrote the text myself, just because I wanted to, using the best of theirs as a template. I also changed it regularly, so people would not get bored with the same old thing - no problem, they did it while I was on the phone, so I could check it was OK. Our house took a while to sell, but I don't think that was their fault. It was an unusual house (widely different estimates from 3 conventional estate agents) so we started high and lowered the price gradually until we started to get interest. Once the price was right, everything else fell into place pretty easily.

not_loaded

SheppyD wrote: »

I sort of agree with the feedback. Most is total rubbish and just makes me angry.
I also think that no estate agent can talk you in to buying a property. We recently bought one and saw many that we just didnt feel were right. So annoying to have to explain why you dont want that house and then have 100 stupid reasons thrown back at you as to why what you believe is not the case.
Having said that - not having any viewings with HN atm!

As an HN customer we’ve repetitively been approached by High Street EAs trying to sign us up, and they’ve all said ‘we will really SELL it to viewers’. I don’t get it. If a viewer was pressured to any degree they’ve all the time in the world to back out, and surely will.

Viewings are at an all time low for us atm.

WallyBird wrote: »

How odd - the same thing happened to us! It did have unfortunate consequences too - a potential buyer was told the house was sold to someone else, when those people had not sold their house and we had made it clear we did not want our house off the market until it was definite. We know this because once it was back on market the buyer tried again and did eventually buy it, and he told us he had tried before two weeks earlier and been told it was already sold…
…Moral seems to be to make it very clear that the house stays on the market and keep checking. In our case, the misinformation was given by phone though, so no way we could have known if the purchaser had not told us.

We kept checking and suddenly, despite our specific instructions, it vanished! Has your account manager got a Jedward hairstyle by any chance?

a_gwtw wrote: »

We've been with HN for over a month and only got 1 viewing, which is a bit disappointing given the properties in our areas seem to sell quite quickly...
We haven't tried any of the tactics raised by others in this forum, as we're in no rush to move yet, but we started wondering whether HN's approach seems to be a bit inactive as some people have mentioned here...

They are reactive which is pretty clear from their website. You get the much-needed RightMove presence though. Have to say though, as above, that our viewings are at an all time low for us right now.

SheppyD

not_loaded wrote: »

As an HN customer we’ve repetitively been approached by High Street EAs trying to sign us up, and they’ve all said ‘we will really SELL it to viewers’. I don’t get it. If a viewer was pressured to any degree they’ve all the time in the world to back out, and surely will.

Viewings are at an all time low for us atm.

We kept checking and suddenly, despite our specific instructions, it vanished! Has your account manager got a Jedward hairstyle by any chance?

They are reactive which is pretty clear from their website. You get the much-needed RightMove presence though. Have to say though, as above, that our viewings are at an all time low for us right now.

It is nice to know that it is not just us that have seen the viewings drop.

I spoke to an EA today that mentioned that most people had decided whether they wanted to buy a place within the first 3 minutes of seeing it. I asked given that did he really seriously think that he could talk anyone around into buying a place and he said no - all that they can do is point out the pros of a place and deal with questions.

I agree- and it really gets on my nerves when you find an EA that thinks otherwise!

confusedroast

I have always used estate agents but decided to go online this time to a) save money b) have more control and c) I do the viewings myself anyway so why pay someone else to wander around and never answer a question corectly

We went on the market with Housenetwork last saturday
We had 9 viewings a couple of days later, then 4 the next day, then on the third day we received 3 offers, we declined all three the same day, day four we received another two offers, one of which was only £5k off the asking price, we accepted and are now under offer

Housenetwork have been fantastic from the start, communication has been extra efficient and so far I have dealt with one person...crossed fingers all goes through:beer:

WallyBird

not_loaded wrote: »

We kept checking and suddenly, despite our specific instructions, it vanished! Has your account manager got a Jedward hairstyle by any chance?

No - but I don't think our account manager caused the problem, more likely one of their phone-people got the wrong idea. They did not actually take it off the market, just told a potential buyer that it was already sold when it wasn't. Luckily, we are very happy in the house we did eventually buy, so it all worked out ok in the end.

pilotj

confusedroast wrote: »

I have always used estate agents but decided to go online this time to a) save money b) have more control and c) I do the viewings myself anyway so why pay someone else to wander around and never answer a question corectly

We went on the market with Housenetwork last saturday
We had 9 viewings a couple of days later, then 4 the next day, then on the third day we received 3 offers, we declined all three the same day, day four we received another two offers, one of which was only £5k off the asking price, we accepted and are now under offer

Housenetwork have been fantastic from the start, communication has been extra efficient and so far I have dealt with one person...crossed fingers all goes through:beer:

It's good you've had a postive experience, I'm interested - did you pay everything upfront or did you take the other option?