Help me sell my house

shamac

LOl Def come north, similar house in Gateshead:

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-37859404.html

and for less than that kind of silly money

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-38575210.html?premiumA=true

Long live the North/South divide!

I_have_spoken

It's London so any 'normal' comment on value is out the window. That said, if you wanted to get a premium price in any area -

+ Outside presentation is poor, weeds in flowerbed, bins on show. No kerb appeal.
+ Catflap in garage door suggests house smells of pets
+ Kitchen - looks small with the bin on show, old fashioned tiles with the oak doors, looking at £15,000 refit right off
+ Bathroom - no shower over bath?
+ Garden - that's diabolical for half a million quid!
+ Dining table in lounge shows kitchen is small but lounge is disproportionately huge!
+ Stairs in lounge, that would put off many buyers and the dark grey dominates
+ No picture of conservatory

Is it worth £525,000? Dunno, round my way that's a £140k house. However, everything recently sold in your area for over £500k has been 4 bed.

36 Links Road, West Wickham, Greater London BR4 0QW
£530,000 Semi-Detached, Freehold 07 Nov 2013 4 bedrooms

22 The Avenue, West Wickham, Greater London BR4 0DY
£540,000 Semi-Detached, Freehold 04 Nov 2013 4 bedrooms
(with the garden I'd expect for my half-million)




This 3 bed sold for much less -

58 Station Road, West Wickham, Greater London BR4 0PR
£435,000 Semi-Detached, Freehold 12 Sep 2013 3 bedrooms

Dazedandconfused

Is this house in a worse area than yours it is much cheaper I know it's a semi but is yours really with an extra 125k I'm not sure

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-28103211.html

This is under offer and was advertised at less than 500k

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-39936076.html

This recently sold for 490
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/house-prices/detailMatching.html?prop=41000824&sale=50484434&country=england

Dazedandconfused

In fact if you look at the ones that recently sold in your street
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/house-prices/detailMatching.html?prop=38703025&sale=399559&country=england
July 500k for 4 bed

phoebe1989seb

fatso80 wrote: »

Thank you for your honest response Pheobe.


As I have mentioned in previous posts, we are not selling to make a quick buck, we are selling to get ourselves out of a very large financial hole.


Should we have had money to get a new kitchen fitted (I have seen painted units/doors go wrong and look even worse) in order to prep the house for sale and new sofas / d!cor done, I probably wouldn't be posting on this website asking for advice.


I appreciate that I have asked for honesty and I have had some very helpful advice, However for you to assume that we have just thought 'oh we wont make much effort because it will sell regardless' is wrong - hence me being on here.

Well, if you are that keen to sell for financial reasons, things such as plumping cushions and tidying the garden wouldn't cost anything but would make a far better impression on someone looking to spend in excess of £500k

Let me explain why I said I was angry -

As someone who has twice needed to sell relatively quickly - first time due to husband's health causing him to give up well paid employment and second due to the ill health of three parents living some 150 miles away - I can appreciate your situation.

First time we were selling a house on the South Coast, priced at just under £700k. We had fully restored it to its Victorian splendour as a family home (it having been four flats when we purchased) and we took great pains to present it well, both for the EA pics and for every viewing - which wasn't easy, it being a 3500 sq ft house spread over several floors Despite our best efforts it didn't sell and as we had a £2k per month mortgage with our new income being only that we made from online selling, we needed to act fast. We slashed the price by £100k and accepted an offer around the new asking price from cash buyers almost immediately......

Fast forward three years and both my parents and my FIL were suffering long-term ill health and we took the decision to sell the house we had bought on the East Coast and had spent £40k+ dragging out of the '80s. We priced realistically, presented the place like a show home and accepted an offer we could live with within two weeks. The whole deal (from marketing to selling and buying our new house) was completed in ten weeks. In the intervening three years prices had fallen and our EA said that if we hadn't done such a good job with renovation & presentation we'd have lingered on the market for months, years even.....however the price we sold for was £20k less than we'd bought it for, so I guess I feel a little bitter when I see sellers making minimal effort which is how your house appeared to me

I guess we're just people that are very design conscious and for whom attention to detail is everything......and having been in a similar situation I know I'd have been making every effort to get a buyer - and being here asking for help is obviously a step in the right direction, so well done for that

GL with the sale......

fatso80

Thanks again for all your responses.

Dazedandconfused, our house is in a catchment area for very good schools which is making some of the difference in prices even within just a few roads.

I appreciate the fact that the house looks unloved, we will work on the advice you have given and keep everything crossed.

Worry_Wart

I clicked on the link thinking the house would be really awful, based on a lot of the comments on here, but it's really not! I hope you're not too disheartened. Lots of good comments about giving the place a cheap spruce up - paint out the banisters, tidy up the garden, I'd paint those tiles in the kitchen too.

Yes, it's crap loads of money, but it is futile comparing it to a northern market (which I am also very happy to be a resident of).

A week of effort and a bit of cash injection, take better photos, drop the price a bit and you'll be good to go. Best of luck!

time2deal

I live in London, and half a mil in my area gets you a 1 bed flat, so I won't comment on the price!
Re the pictures:

• 1. I think you only need 1 picture of the front, and picture 8 is much nicer. Balanced and clearly showing only your house. Invest in some black paint and re-paint the garage door. Clear out the weeds (a job that will take about 90 seconds!). Put a plant in the pot by the door. Borrow one from a neighbour maybe? Get some nice cheap flowering plants for that little strip by the front door and along the side. Is the sky photoshopped in? It looks like it was a rainy day. Wait til the area is dry. Wet paving looks dreary.
• 2. I'd drop this photo too. 7 is a better angle, see my comments on that.
• 3. I think the cupboards are fine. Buy some bright flowers and put them in the lovely alcove. Put out a few bottles of wine, or olive oil or something to give some personality and 'lifestyle'. A pretty fruit bowl maybe.
• 4. This room is very bland. (sorry!). Get some coloured sheets, or do that posh thing with multiple pillows and a silky runner to look like a really posh bedroom. I don't like mirrored wardrobes, so I'd take the photo from the other end of the room, but that may be personal taste. Bedside tables and lamps (that you can take with you). I think these look lovely: http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/products/50163872/
  Few pillows, some fancy bedding and it could close to this:
  
• 5. Looks ok.
• 6. This is a big problem area. Mossy fence (can you borrow a pressure washer or paint?) Mud pit of goalposts. I'd get rid of them. Clear out the weeds, and again photograph it dry. Get rid of the ladder, the ball on the right and whatever junk there is around. If you can stomach it, get the garden re-turfed. A garden is a wonderful feature, but yours is currently just a lot of work! Is that childs house yours? If so move it into the garden where it looks like a sweet feature, not a bit of rubbish in the corner. If not, borrow it!
• 7. Get the photographer to climb behind the TV, or move the TV, to get as much of the room in as possible. Remove the arm cushions from your sofas. They make it look sort of sad and crumpled. If it looks ok without the back cushion then remove them too. Clear the rubbish under the stairs. Clean the carpets. The grime around the sofas is horrible!

Conservatory.. other bedrooms.. where are they? Conservatory must be lovely, but if it's full of junk then tidy up, and get some pictures. Even if it means moving the clutter to another room for the photos.

Sorry - probably too detailed and a bit harsh, but just what I would do. I think you should invest £200-400, (+£400 for the turf) rather then take another £25k hit. Most of the work can be done yourself with elbow grease and some patient picture taking.

Are you getting viewers and no offers? Or no viewers?

steve2005

My general thoughts based on the photos alone and forgetting about the area:

Living room looks large, but empty. Kind of feelingless
Kitchen looks alright, but for gods sake give the cooker a clean
Garden definitely needs a once over
Curb appeal desperately needed. Looking on Zoopla etc I wouldn't click to look at that proprty from the list of results.

Just IMO

moneyshoe

I wouldn't view your house based on the photos (also because I live in the frozen north of edinburgh). The real deal breaker for me is lack of dining kitchen and the dining area in the lounge looks horribly cramped. If there was a lovely dining area in the conservatory I might be tempted to view. Also the goalposts in the garden look terrible and smaller than it really is. Agree with the stamp duty threshold. Good luck.