Zoopla estimate affecting sale?

fluffymuffy

I'm trying to sell a house that my mother owned jointly with me until I bought out her share. The last sale of the property is therefore shown to be about half the price that the other houses in the street go for. That's because I already owned half the house.

Zoopla list my house as being worth only slightly more than the half price. They simply took the last land registry entry and added a little for inflation.

I'm concerned that this will be affecting the sale potential of my house. It's currently on the market and the most recent viewer commented that he'd checked on the internet and my house is vastly overpriced.

What to do? I've asked Zoopla to revise their estimate (no reply from them yet). How much reliance do people put on these things? If I could just get people to come and look at it I'm sure it would sell in no time (you can't see it from the road).

mrsmchapman

A house I have just previously sold was £65k higher than the highest in the street and about £45-50k higher than the estate. Many things affect price, ie build, land, bedrooms etc, I would ignore the zoopla site, I have never found these to be accurate it underestimated our house by £30k yet we achieved a lot higher. They are not very good especially for those ftb's who seem to take the price as gospel!!!!

Gra76

fluffymuffy wrote: »

How much reliance do people put on these things?

Absolutely none whatsoever. Zoopla is a crude tool at best. At worst it's wildly innacurate.

mrsmchapman

However are you getting any viewings? If so the house is priced ok if no viewings at all you need to look at the price it's on the market for, not everyone looks a zoopla and other sites for sold previous and street prices so this won't be the reason for lack of viewings.

ciderboy2009

fluffymuffy wrote: »

...the most recent viewer commented that he'd checked on the internet and my house is vastly overpriced.

Did he specifically state that he'd checked on Zoopla?

How does the price of your house compare with others for sale in the area?

I've never come across anyone who would base a value a Zoopla estimate without looking at the prices of other sales in the area - if people did then developers would never be able to sell on old houses they'd modernised.

gazter

you can manipulate the prices on zoopla, if thats important to you.

martinsurrey

First thing is to get the Land registry to exclude the data

http://www.landregistry.gov.uk/market-trend-data/public-data/price-paid-faq#m16

Sales of part of a house should NOT be in their sold price data.

Then after this has filtered through, get zoopla to update thier data.

I'm not sure how to go about it, but hopefully the great Land Reg poster will read this and let us know.

Its only a stupid buyer who relies solely on a Zoopla valuation, but its all a part of giving your buyer comfort that they are getting value for money, so its well worth making sure its correct.

somethingcorporate

Zoopla is incredibly crude, identical houses on our current street range from £160k-320k on there!

dominoman

I wouldn't worry at all. The price will be set by what people are willing to pay.

martinsurrey

dominoman wrote: »

I wouldn't worry at all. The price will be set by what people are willing to pay.

and people are willing to pay what they perceive to be good value.

people opinions of good value is effected by many things, newspaper articles on the housing market, sold prices of nearby houses, and values attributed to a house by popular websites.

While most on MSE KNOW that Experian credit rating numbers are pointless, the wider public don’t, just as most on here KNOW that Zoopla guide price is all but useless, but the wider public don’t, and only a fool would ignore something that could help them sell their house, especially when it is so easy to correct.

GirlWonder

I personally do check online... But we have moved across the country twice now and it's a good starting point to:

A. Find out how quickly things sell and how often they come up in desirable areas... And B. what properties have sold for recently.

That said I totally agree with people here. It's a starting point and only useful when you look at trends, not individual estimates. I also find it more useful lookin at actual sold prices rather than estimated guesses.

Our last house we sold we did receive an offer which was the exact zoopla estimate!!! This was way off base but because we needed a quick sale we met halfway and only took a ten grand hit since 2007.

It could have been a coincidence, but it was odd that they offered the exact zoopla guess initially... Of course they don't take into account work done and what state you bought the house in!