Just tell me if there is something wrong...

halesowenmum

Squoozy wrote: »

I've had a look at the house and I think its lovely. I can't see any reason for you not getting any views, but as a word of encouragement my son had the same problem with his house in Cornwall. It was clearly priced correctly (£2000 less than he paid for it, having spent at least £4000 on it) and in really good condition. He simply had no views for 8 weeks, and eventually switched agents. He immediately had a viewing, the woman wanted to move straight away, and the house sale was completed for the asking price within a month.

My view is that some agents simply don't work at selling a house. You have no idea what they are saying to potential buyers, whether they are perhaps pushing other houses rather than yours. I would consider switching agents when you can, and meanwhile consider any other advice that has been given re the garden etc. Don't lose heart. House selling and buying is a really stressful process, but hopefully eventually you will be able to move and put this behind you.

Thank you Squoozy - I'm living in hope!!

JimmyTheWig

halesowenmum wrote: »

People have presumably looked on Zoopla for this information and assumed that the price Zoopla state (which although correct) is the price as determined just by market forces at the time when in fact the price being as low as it was was because the vendor wanted a very quick sale. As I said before, sites like that don't give you a full picture.

I'm not saying you're wrong.
But there's nothing particularly wrong with the house or advert, so if it was priced "correctly" then you would expect 10 viewings and an offer in the first 4-6 weeks.

Plenty of suggestions on here that can help. Some of which you've already started with, which is great. But I don't think that anyone has picked out anything that you can fix that will make the difference between no-one viewing and enough people viewing to make it likely that you get an offer.

Definitely worth seeing that happens with the new agent. But I'm afraid to say that the only thing (possibly with the exception of photos that make the rooms look the large size that they are) you can do to significantly change things around is drop the price. Or come off the market and wait until early spring?

Mojisola

halesowenmum wrote: »

EA called me late afternoon, she's coming Monday to take more (better!!) pictures and is going to rejig the order. Then when rightmove update their listings (which I am told they do every night, not the same day), then it will show but I've still got replacement pics needing to be taken by EA#1, and later on Monday morning new pics being taken by EA#2 so hopefully by middle of next week we should have a better visual to show people.

Why isn't the EA doing a floor plan as well as new photos? It isn't something that you should be paying extra for.

halesowenmum

Mojisola wrote: »

Why isn't the EA doing a floor plan as well as new photos? It isn't something that you should be paying extra for.

Well. I already had the EPC (energy certificate wotsit) for the house so I just gave them that and they used it. Apparently the guy who does this also usually does the layouts as well. I'm waiting for a price from the for that but in the interim I asked for a quote from a different company which was £85. I've now found one called floorplansusketch.com and it's under £9!! You make a sketch (you can take some of your measurements from what the agent measures the rest do yourself), draw a rough outline of the rooms, doors, windows, position of hobs, sinks baths and so on, nothing fancy. You send the sketch in, they produce draft 1 and you can amend it up to 3 times until it's right. I think this is the way I'll be going so already done a rough draft and tonight I will get any outstanding measurements and then scan my draft drawings and email them off to the company. I think it's a brilliant idea! After I've finished the process I'll report back to let people know as it could be useful for anyone who hasn't for some reason got floor plans from their agent or whatever.

Catti

Parking. Unless this is something else that the photos aren't telling us. Its a 3 bed house - likely to be minimum of 2 cars in use, plus visitors.

We looked at a new build recently that was really nicely done - except that it only had parking for one car. Completely hopeless and discounted it without any further thought.

Even if we only used one car, its a bet that the neighbours would have more and the area would look dreadful because of the parking.

Mojisola

All the EAs I talked to before putting the house on the market included the floor plan as part of the service. Why should you have to pay extra for such a basic selling feature?

StumpyPumpy

halesowenmum wrote: »

Hiya. The price i paid for it was £20k under what it was actually valued at at the time at the time as the company had gone into administration and needed rid of the properties fast (which goes to show that sites like Zoopla really don't give the full picture). This is one of the only 2.5 storey houses in a much larger geographical area than the immediate locality and as such, it's going to be valued a bit higher I would guess, because of that.

When I moved in I spent £20k on it making the replacing the bathroom suites throughout and making the en suite a full bathroom, re flooring all kitchens and bathrooms, reflooring the ground floor, adding fencing and power to the garden, upgrading all the electrics so there were actually a proper number of sockets in the house, and a whole range of other works as well as of course normal decoration.

I obviously can't comment on the views, plans, objectives or otherwise of the builder - never met the guy - I just bought a house that I really liked and which is now in mint condition so that, unlike similar properties or even those on at less money (which many of them are if not least for the fact they are generally all significantly smaller), mine is in mint decorative, structural and overall order subject only to decorative changes any individual might want to make when they move in somewhere which is entirely up to them to carry out if they wish to. Clearly the houses have been purchased by me and my two neighbours and as such they must be ticking the boxes since all three of us have one or two adults and two children living in them and we bought them and really liked them. I totally understand that this design of house is not to the liking of everyone but the advantage of it is that it's able to provide MUCH larger rooms than your average, typical semi which was one of the appeals for me - it's the most spacious home I've ever lived in.

That may all be true, but that is not what any potential buyers would see. Zoopla may not tell the whole story, but it is, nonetheless, the only story that is told apart from your listing and your listing tells nothing that contradicts it.

One thing that is in the Zoopla (well, land registry) story is that your neighbours paid approx £10k more than you - one on the same day. Most people would not interpret that as meaning you got a special deal, but that there is a £10k premium on having an end, rather than a middle terrace in this area. I know that might not be accurate, but that is the interpretation most buyers will see. The fact that you think you got a bargain is moot. No buyer knows that or would trust that the valuation you had was accurate enough to factor in.

Obviously, you like your house, so it makes you defensive, that is fine. I'm just telling you how I, as a buyer, would see it, which is what you asked for. I might be unique in my views, but, let's face it, as you've said people aren't beating a path to your door. My views would be different if I were selling it, of course they would: as a seller you want to maximise your return whilst balancing your need to move on.

There are no massive red flags for me in the general condition or presentation on Rightmove - some tweaks maybe but nothing serious - which leaves only a couple of things. First is the location, which is hardly something you can do anything about, despite people pointing out that your house would be worth much more somewhere else. The other thing is the price. It really is that simple. You can set your price at whatever level you want but until the market catches up or you get, really, really lucky nothing is going to happen.

The amount people spend on doing a property up or change it to fit their personal requirements, does not correlate to an increase in price as any one in the housing trade can tell you. Personally, a freshly decorated house adds very little to my interest, as long as the house is generally sound, the chances are I'll decorate anyway, so I'm not going to pay more, and re-arranging floorplans will hardly ever add any value unless you are adding extensions etc - it is just convenience for you. As I am an over cautious sort, I'd also question the need to spend that amount of money on what was a three year old house, doing things that I might not have wanted done, I immediately start to question the build quality of the original propery. Which leaves a bit of a conundrum. I can't recommend that you highlight the money you spent and the improvements you made, because that would actually put me off as a buyer of such a new house, but I can't see any other way of representing the added investment you say you have made in it.

I am not saying any of the above is representative of the historical truth of the house, just trying to give you a full description of how I would feel about it as a buyer. Rebutting the items I've detailed is pointless: you would never be able to justify your changes and price point to the people that matter, that is real potential buyers who aren't giving you that opportunity as they are not even coming to look around or speak to you.

SP

halesowenmum

Mojisola wrote: »

All the EAs I talked to before putting the house on the market included the floor plan as part of the service. Why should you have to pay extra for such a basic selling feature?

I'm in total agreement with you!

Caveat_Mortgagor

Unfortunately for you the price you paid shows up along with your listing on Rightmove under the heading 'Properties sold nearby'

I wouldnt contemplate a property that is priced so far above what you paid in 2010. It gives the impression that:-

1. You are either trying it on with the price or completely deluded
2. It will take a long while for reality to hit home with you
3. Any time spent looking at the RM listing is dead time that you'll never get back

Sorry to be so blunt.

PS - the wallpaper makes almost F-all difference to a serious buyer. The key things are location, space and price. And for the space you offer in your location, the information on your Rightmove listing suggests the price is wrong.

TBagpuss

Good to know you are getting a floor plan, as I think that it's a real disadvantage not to have one.

As others have said,if you aren't getting viewings at all, then unless the market in your area is very depressed I think the most likely reason is price.

My personal views on your house:

1. It's a mid terrace. That's something which would put me off,so it may reduce your pool of potential buyers. Also, you main photos showing the two neighbouring houses and the parked car make it look as though your house is really narrow, barely wider thatn the car. I think that's probably partly an optical illusion but it might be worth considering whether it would be better to take the picture from a different angle, or closer in, so it is more focussed on your house. (also, that pictures makes it look as though the other two are both slighter bigger than yours, and possibly have extra access at the sides, so it looks as though yours is least appealing of the 3, at first glance!

2. Now of the photos give good views of the rooms. I'm left with the impression that the rooms are small as it's not been possible to get a clear overview of any of them. Having read as far as the descriptions and measurements of the rooms, i don't think that's true, but it is impression I get from the photos.

3. Rugs on the floors in the living room and blue bedroom would make it look a bit more welcoming.

4. Beds - all look a bit untidy - could you iron the duvet covers for the pictures, or use throws?

5. Master bedroom - I would absolutely *hate* to have a bed in that position, as there's (from the photos) no head room and hardly any space to get along the side of the bed(esp. the far side) From the picture I get no sense of the size of that room or whether there would be other options as to how to arrange the furniture. It might be you could put it with the head on the wall you've got your chests of drawers on, but I can't tell from the pictures. That would really put me off. it leaves me with the impression that that room is really small, awkwardly shaped and impractical. The training wires behind the TV and the heap of ?shoes? don't help.

6.Pictures 10,11 & 15 - can't tell what the configuration is - are 10 and 11 both the ensuite, or are 11 and 15 the bath room? again, because you can only see a part of the room it makes them appear really small. If they are all of the ensuite, why no picture of the bathroom?

7. Garden picture (50 is really off putting. It makes it look as though you never use the garden, and (especially as it's obvious from the other pictures that you have children) , that rings alarm feels as it makes be wonder what's wrong with the surroundings, or the neighbours, that you've given up on using the the outside space. If you don't want to turf it then some planters with flowers and greenery, and maybe some chairs so it looks as though you use the space, would help.

Over all it looks as though the house is well decorated and looked after, but then these things drag it down.

Have you talked to the agents about what you could do to make it more visually appealing? Honestly having seen the photos I don't think they have done a very good job for you of presenting the property. (they've said in the particulars that there are 'panoramic views' If you've got a nice view, take a picture of it and add it in. If they just mean you can see out of the windows then get them to take the reference to views out of the blurb!
Good Luck.