Please Help!! First House sale, only two viewings in three weeks!

olly300

I wouldn't take out a advert in the local paper simply because your potential buyer could come from either York, Tadcaster or further a field. (See my original comments) When I was house hunting and most of the people I know who have house hunted, all different price ranges, we used the internet.

Have a look at other properties on rightmove with 4 bedrooms plus with different EA's and see how they are advertised.

As a potential buyer I don't need to see pictures of the shower room, the view from the front of the house or the landing. I would like a pictures of:
1. at least 2 bedrooms including master bedroom
2. the kitchen not looking crammed so you may need to pictures
3. lounge looking spacious
4. front of house including garage and some of the front garden
5. "family" bathroom showing as much of the suite as possible
6. rear garden
If the EA photographer couldn't take decent pictures of any of the rooms mentioned then take them yourself or get a friend to take them using a digital camera.

pusscat

The first thing I do when I am looking at a property is check out it's history.

This property was last sold in June 2001 for £114k. At an asking price of £345k that gives an inflation rate of over 300% in 6 years. The statistics of sold prices in the area around you would put the asking price of your property in the top 9% of all properties in the area - Is the property of that quality?
If it is then the photos/details do not do it justice - it looks like a run of the mill 3 bed 60's bungalow with a limited headroom loft conversion.

The botttom line is that this is not a pretty house and the area is one of the cheaper and less desireable areas around York - it is not in the Golden Triangle (whatever your EA says....) and it is on the Selby side of the A64, in the local district of Selby (snob value). Any house that is not pretty and/or not in the best location has to offer far more for the money than the pretty/well located competion.

The fifth bedroom (I suspect - rightly or wrongly, particularly as there is no picture!) is not really a useable bedroom (limited headroom?) and that is why there is not picture of it. This makes the property only really 4 beds in my mind. I also suspect that the details show the room sizes, not the actual useable space in the rooms upstairs - I suspect that the lower headroom makes the rooms a lot smaller. This should be made clear in the details.

The way we would use the house would be as a master bed suite, shower room and dressing room/study upstairs (probably using the landing too), 2 kids bedrooms and a bathroom downstairs, one living room, one dining/family room and the breakfast kitchen.
As you can see, this makes the property only a 3 bed house for us.

A quick search on rightmove shows that you can buy a new 4/5 and 6
bedroom detached with all the trimmings (a few miles away) for less/similar money than is being asked for this (they are still over priced IMHO) and there are numerous developments.

Looking for a 5 bed family home at that kind of price I would expect to see 2 receptions, a utility room, a dining kitchen, a formal dining room and a double garage, at least one en suite and dressing room and a guest cloakroom as well as the 5 bedrooms. For me, your house has too many bedrooms and not enough living space. You only have one living space - with kids in the house you need a second living space.

The rightmove map shows the village directly beteen 2 railway lines - I would automtically think of the noise.
If I am honest - the picture of the outside does nothing for me at all - I would have just flicked straight past it without even reading the details.

My feeling is that you would be far better marketing is house as a reasonable standard 4 bedroom property with a second reception/family room or a study or a dining room. This would be far more effective than marketing as a "below spec" 5 bed. You are competing against properties like this

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-14040082.rsp?pa_n=4&tr_t=buy
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-15089108.rsp?pa_n=3&tr_t=buy
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-15070855.rsp?pa_n=1&tr_t=buy
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-14671102.rsp?pa_n=3&tr_t=buy
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-14671102.rsp?pa_n=3&tr_t=buy

Please don't take any offense at anything I have said - I am just being honest and explaining why I would not arrange a viewing.

Bottom line for me is that the house is way over priced. For the right price you can overlook a lot of it's faults, but a top spec price requires a top spec house. Either the details do not do the house justice or the EA has over priced it.

Hope this helps - I have edited it loads to try and make it sound less harsh - but inthe end I thought you would probably want to hear it anyway.....

Puss
XX

xela_17

What Pusscat says is very sensible, especially the part about viewers expecting a 4/5 bed house to have second living space. Can you show one of the downstairs bedrooms as living space, perhaps using the sofa from the landing? Also, the second property that Pusscat links to has a great picture of its garden - four pictures in one showing the garden from all angles. You could also do this and then include a couple of pics of bedrooms.

rufus_bp

Hi

Thanks for all the criticism, it's interesting to get another perspective. It sounds like the photos need sorting out. I think the price is about right for the area, but I guess the market will let me know whether that's correct. One of the reasons I selected the local agent is that they usually price property realistically. I'm open to offers!

Although Bolton Percy appears to be near Cawood / Sherburn/ Wistow /Selby etc it's at least 5 or 6 miles by road as there's the river wharfe in the way. Property here is generally more expensive here than in those places.

Anyway thanks for being so honest in your posts.

-rob

joapet

I can't believe how cheap house prices are up north! where i live, for a house liek that you are looking around the £500 mark. Eeek. Have you ever thought of somehow attracting it to people down south? because they might be able to afford it. Just a thought.

If you hold tight, someone will snap it up soon..because a lot of people want to sell before the home information pack thing comes in.

lessonlearned

It's early days yet, try not to panic.

Mine is on the market too, again only two viewings in 2 weeks. I also work as a New Homes Sales Negotiator and the market does seem a wee bit quiet at the moment.

I think this is because of the recent announcements about increased mortgage rates. I've been selling houses for a long time and I've noticed that the market does tend to dip when mortgage rates go up. Generally, the market bounces back again after a few weeks.

I've looked at the website and, like the other posters, I agree that the photos look a bit amateur. I would skip the shower room, the bathroom (which is fine but not especially luxurious or spectacular) and landing pics (or at least the landing as it is at the moment - see comments re landing below). The garden is lovely and you could make more of that. A couple of pictures of the largest bedrooms would be useful.

I also agree that it might be better to present your house as a 4 bed property and change one of the downstairs bedrooms into a formal dining room.

At present you have a combined kitchen/diner which is a good size but it means that technically you only have one reception room. A 5 bed/1 reception sounds "top heavy" and might put people off.

Property is, of course, very expensive just about everywhere in the UK, however, £350K is a lot of money and people do have very high expectations in this price range.

I think a four bedroomed/2 reception layout would be better at meeting those expectations. I also think that a 4 bedroomed property deserves a formal dining room. The kitchen/diner could then be classed as a breakfast kitchen, which will make the property seem more "up market".


The landing looks lovely and spacious and is a real bonus, however it looks a bit spartan - you could make a real feature of this. I would dress this as a small study/reading area. Sorry, although I think the cow is lovely, it really is just too personal and quirky - she'll have to find some nice warm place to stay until you move to your next place!!

The kitchen looks a bit cluttered, and the lounge looks rather "busy". I would remove the guitar (too personal) the extra chair, and the "pouffe".

Ideally, sofas should match, you could use throws and cushions in complementing colours to pull the look together.

Other than that, I think it looks a very nice property, in good decorative order (the terracota walls in the kitchen are very personal and some people might object but that is a minor detail - it might be better to neutralise the colour though).

I wouldn't start lashing out £500 on advertising just yet. Why not have a word with your Estate Agent to see what else they can offer you. Suggest to them that they make a little featurette of your property within their own advert, for example calling it "property of the week".

Good luck, keep your fingers crossed - for your house and mine!!

rufus_bp

Update on my house sale

I've now had a grand total of three viewings. I've got a second viewing this weekend.

A house very similar

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-14577886.rsp?pa_n=1&tr_t=buy

, but smaller, is now under offer in the next village about a mile away it was up for 329K.

I think the agent has done a much better job with the photos for this one, than my agent!

rufus_bp

PropertyGuru wrote: »

If that is worth £350,000 then I'm the Tooth Fairy.

Hi

The house is on the market for £345K, I've just had an offer of £340K after the third viewing.

I'll contact you if I loose any teeth. :rotfl:

sm9ai

Sounds like a very good offer approx 98.5% of asking price.

Normally its around 5%

poppy10_2

Hideously overpriced for what it is, I almost feel sorry for the dolt who will be taking it off your hands.