Selling our house - parking

lessonlearned

Lack of parking will restrict the number in the "buying pool".

Your EA should have taken the lack of parking into account with their initial market valuation, so it shouldn't be necessary to make any price adjustments just on that basis.

If your house is proving popular and the lack of parking is the only negative I would just wait and see. There will be someone for whom parking is not too important.

You say you rent a garage, how formal is this arrangement. Will the next purchaser be able to rent. I would try and get this arrangement formalised and then include the information in the sales particulars.

Ie the cost of rental and the length of the contract.

hwalkerh

Thanks for all the great comments, had a good stream of viewers so hopefully it will be fine. As there is plenty of parking that will hopefully help.

I keep saying how much i like that no one parks outside the house, surely this is better then a road

lessonlearned

I agree - the outlook from your house is much nicer than looking at a pile of metal - no matter how nice the car is - it can't compete with greenery.

Unfortunately we have to put the wretched things somewhere...

I am particularly finding it difficult in my house search, parking is an absolute requirement. I have to drive a WAV - a (wheelchair accessible vehicle). I hate it, it's like driving a tank and it's a killer to park.

I've had to rule out some lovely houses because they only had on street parking and I just wouldn't be able to park.

twink22

It would put me off, but it would do even if the price was lowered, we have had issues with a neighbour threatening us due to my husbands work van parked outside their house where we are at the moment, so we only look for houses with driveways now.

I dont think lowering the price would help, if they want parking they won't choose it even at a reduced price.

sneekymum

When looking for a house, long ago, when my children were small, I rejected ones I couldn't park right outside, even if just for a short time to unload the shopping. Otherwise I'd have had to put the children in the house and left them there along while I made a few trips back to the car.

If there's at least a dropping-off area that would help.

grifferz

hwalkerh wrote: »

I keep saying how much i like that no one parks outside the house, surely this is better then a road

It does look nicer than a load of cars but a lot of people will see or imagine practical problems.

We currently rent a flat in a very similar situation as this photo, and the very limited on-road parking coupled with someone local who parks up 4 or 5 vehicles for sale permanently means that whenever we have visitors they have to park quite a long way away down the street.

As a result in our recent search for a house to buy - even though we do not own a car ourselves - we considered off-road parking for at least 1 vehicle to be near-essential. We don't want to buy a property where we have to deal with that.

I appreciate that it's worked out okay for you, I am just telling you what would go through my mind as a potential purchaser.

(Parking up lots of vehicles for sale on the public highway is apparently illegal, so we have reported the continual mass of cars to the council. However the council response is that as no more than two of the cars have the same phone number on them at any one time they consider it as a few private individuals trying to sell their vehicles and it is allowed. All I can say is, these private individuals have certainly shifted a lot of cars over the last four years!)

moneyistooshorttomention

hwalkerh wrote: »

Thanks for all the great comments, had a good stream of viewers so hopefully it will be fine. As there is plenty of parking that will hopefully help.

I keep saying how much i like that no one parks outside the house, surely this is better then a road

Well it is in my personal opinion - and I personally favour houses where there is some extra "garden" space I feel I could "borrow" (if only for visual purposes). Hence to me that green at the front would more than counterbalance - provided I had enough storage space in the house to cover not having a garage.

As the house is a smaller type one - I would be looking to put my storeable stuff up into the loft (courtesy of no garage for it). So - I would be asking whether that was possible - and wanting to know where the loft hatch was situated/how big it is/is their a pull-down loft ladder already and boarding and light up there. I don't know how many people would be thinking along the same lines as me on that one - but it would cost you just a few hundred £s to make a loft into storage space (if you can do it yourself that is) and it would be worth it to me (as a buyer) to pay you a couple of thousand £s extra to have that loft storage space.

That having the road some way away from the house would also represent extra privacy to me - as no-one would have reason to walk along that pavement between your garden and the green unless they had "business" in one of these houses - so hopefully fewer passers-by (though there will always be some who walk somewhere they have no reason to walk "just because they can").

seven-day-weekend

We have never had a drive, garage or parking space in over forty years of marriage . We have always had to park in the street, wherever we have lived, even in our little Spanish village. So although I would prefer parking, it would not put me off, and in fact I would love a little green outside my house.

Quite interestingly, in 2012 our son bought a flat with a garage just round the corner from us, neither he nor his partner drive, we were thinking, great we will have a garage at last. However, in true MSE fashion, he instantly rented it out to his friend to store his motorcycle in . We can get our trailer in it however, so that's one less item we have to cater for!

But no, if I liked everything else the set-up you have described would not put me off.

HappyMJ

Reducing the price won't help. If it doesn't appeal to someone due to the parking then knocking a couple thousand off will make no difference at all. It's either on the short list or it isn't.

J_i_m

When I'll be looking to buy and assuming a car is an essential part of my transport then the very least I'll be looking for is an allocated parking space visible from inside my home.

A personal dedicated driveway would be better and/or an in situ garage absolutely ideal.

I'm aware that in any house search compromises have to be made, but I'm sorry an out of view parking space or garage in a block around the corner to me would be a real deal breaker.

This isn't for practical reasons, I have no problem with walking 20 metres plus to my car, and I already walk into town for most of my grocery shopping. No, for me the security of my car would be my concern. Although in reality it shouldn't make a difference from a psychological point of view I'd feel far better being able to see my car from my window and a garage in a block seems far more prone to vandalism than an in situ garage on your very own drive way.