Do I find a house and then market my flat??

chelseablue

Forgive me if this is obvious but I've never sold a property before.


I live in a flat that I own and would like to move to a house at some point.


What is the procedure? Should I find a house I like first then put my place on the market.


Flats sell pretty quick here, one in the next block went under offer in a week


Houses in the areas where I want to live don't come up very often, and this will be a family home that we will be living in for years hopefully so am quite fussy!


So could end up selling my flat and having nowhere to go

mattyprice4004

One option is to rent somewhere if your flat sells - that can work out cheaper if you get a good offer.
Otherwise, put your flat on the market and then start looking. If they sell quickly, you'll have the freedom to hold out for a good offer.

ellie27

Well I think in your case it would be best to sell the flat first then go into rented accommodation.

If you tried to buy my house without even having your own house on the market I would tell you were to go (politely!) and would not take you as a serious buyer.

For you to look like a serious buyer and to have any chance of having an offer accepted on a house that you like you really need to be in the position that you have already accepted an offer on your own flat first and have a mortgage in principal/AIP ready.

SailorSam

I think you need to find a buyer before any serious house hunting.
If your flat did sell quickly you can always slow things down while you found a new house.

chelseablue

mattyprice4004 wrote: »

One option is to rent somewhere if your flat sells - that can work out cheaper if you get a good offer.
Otherwise, put your flat on the market and then start looking. If they sell quickly, you'll have the freedom to hold out for a good offer.

It would be much more expensive to rent round here, my mortgage is £475 a month and a 2 bed flat rents for approx £900+


My mother in law does have 2 spare rooms, maybe I could ask her to put us up until we found somewhere?

ellie27

chelseablue wrote: »

It would be much more expensive to rent round here, my mortgage is £475 a month and a 2 bed flat rents for approx £900+


My mother in law does have 2 spare rooms, maybe I could ask her to put us up until we found somewhere?

Similar here, my mortgage is £380 p/m and the rent I have been paying for the last 6 months is £800 p/m......but I sold and now have the cash from my sale and am getting the keys to our new home tomorrow!! The house we are buying is 'almost perfect'. It was not on sale when we sold our house and it took time to find something like this, as we are quite fussy and do have priorities that need ticked.

If you are able to stay with family then that would be great! We unfortunately did not have that option. And do remembetr

PasturesNew

Best thing to do is get your flat ready to sell, do all those little jobs, then get the agents round because once you agree to sell through any agent he'll be popping his camera out of his pocket before you can say "viewing"... and you don't want to have bad photos taken.

While you're doing that, start viewing houses online.

Agent will take photos, then prepare the details and send them to you, you read them and agree them, then they go live. At this point start booking viewings for houses to buy, but you can't put any offer in until you've got a buyer for yours.

Old_Git

It really does depend on the market in your area .
If flats sell quickly but houses don't come up often I would be looking for a house before trying to sell my flat .

ReadingTim

A seller (or rather their agent) needs to determine the proceedability of a buyer - there's no point accepting an offer which is dependent on a lottery win in order for the cash to change hands. So if you need money from the sale of your flat in order to fund the purchase of the next house, you need to show you're making progress with selling said flat. That could be having accepted an offer yourself, but at the very least it should be on the market. Otherwise, as others have said, you won't be taken seriously as a buyer.

I appreciate it seems like a chicken and egg situation, but it's just part and parcel of being in a chain - your buyer will have to accept that you might not move until you've found a new house, or, if you need to break the chain to keep it moving, gone into rented accommodation temporarily

Hoploz

If your flat will sell quickly then get it ready for marketing, get your agebts in etc. Find a house, then put yours straight on the market same day, then you'll have sold in time to make your offer a few days later

If you sell then rent, apart from the increased monthly cost you'll be throwing away each month you will lose out on any uplift in the market, so if it takes 6 months or more to find something, your flat would have increased in value and also what you're buying will have too.

Red-Squirrel_2

Hoploz wrote: »

If your flat will sell quickly then get it ready for marketing, get your agebts in etc. Find a house, then put yours straight on the market same day, then you'll have sold in time to make your offer a few days later

If things are selling quickly in her area, and houses don't come up for sale that often, then this plan will probably see them missing out to a more proceedable buyer.

I sold my flat in a week, which isn't bad, but the houses I've looked at have sometimes been taken off the market within a day or two, some have even gone to sealed bids. I was one of three people to offer on the house I'm now buying, and it was only the fact that my sale was well underway that meant I got it not one of the others.

If I were you OP, I'd have a chat with your mother-in-law, if she offers to let you stay in between selling and buying I'd take her up on it and put yourself in a solid position ready to pounce when the right house comes along.

Good luck.