QUICK SALE SCHEMES: Are they any good?

EG57

When I die? huu ... but that won't happen! I don't plan to die ! I've got a special exemption from the Great Maker for services rendered during my lifetime ! Joking apart, it seems to me that, after having read all of your useful suggestions, my best option is to sell and retire - soon, or well before retirement age - to a nice, cosy, little house in a village by the sea in Puglia and pay a fraction of the rent (£200 a month) I would be paying if I were to live and grow old here in the UK ! Given the present difference in the cost of living between the UK and Italy, and the current exchange rate £ pound / euro, £ 120.000 should last me a long time ! .. I might even be able start a little business out there ! Does that make sense?

Pixie5740

Retiring by the sea in Puglia with a decent wedge in your pocket or either continuing to live on an estate you hate or paying out £1000s in rent each year. It's a tough call.

Conrad

You should not be thinking in terms of '£120k will last a long time' as this implies you will be spending the actual capital and it wont last that long really.
Always the smart person would look to invest it (safely) and live off the monthly income.


Remember lots of people get ripped off with safe sounding investments every day, don't be one of them. I don't mean this rudely at al but you seem quite ripe for being ripped off, just be very careful. On TV this morning were couples that had lost everything to seeming safe property investments.

jonathanrolande

I am (as Pixie5740 would say) a blood sucking leech!

Cash buying firms are an option if you need a guaranteed sale/don’t want to pay auction fees up front with no guarantee of sale/have a property with issues/don’t want lots of strangers round your house viewing.

However, you will likely only receive around 80% of the market value. My form cover costs like lawyers etc so you’ll save a bit there but still end up with about 83% ish so think carefully about it obviously.

One commenter mentioned last minute price reductions. This won’t happen if you use an accredited firm, see ww.napb.co.uk for a list of them who signed up to a Code of Conduct. Maybe try an agent first and resort to a Cash Buyer if you don’t have any luck?

eddddy

jonathanrolande wrote: »

...
However, you will likely only receive around 80% of the market value. My form cover costs like lawyers etc so you’ll save a bit there but still end up with about 83% ish so think carefully about it obviously.

Hmmm - So Jonathan, am I missing something?

Almost by definition, the price an EA can achieve is a property's market value.

So your mantra is "Come to us and get 83% of what an EA would get".

Typically, properties don't sell because the EA's asking price is too high. I assume you don't offer 80% of the EA's asking price, you offer 80% of the price needed to get an immediate sale.

So that could be 60% or even 50% of the EA's asking price.


Perhaps instead of coming to you last, sellers should come to you first to get your offer price....

... and then say to a regular EA "Jonathan has offered me £x, I'll give you x weeks to find me a cash buyer who'll pay at least £x+£10k".


I can see that you might take a lot of hassle out of the house selling process. A 5% fee might even be justifiable for that (compared to an EA's 1.5%) - but taking 17% to 20% is outrageous.

EG57

Living in Puglia sounds nice, especially around the Salento area, also known as the Italian Maldive. But, as Conrad rightly pointed out, we should also plan to invest some of the cash from the sale into something that will yield a little profit. Also, my partner and I were thinking of either opening a language school over there, or starting an English-Italian magazine for the local English speaking community, or even an animal sanctuary, just to mention 3 ideas.
Unfortunately, I know little or nothing about investment and I don’t trust the stock market. A few months ago we were contacted by an EA which valued our two bedroom semi-detached house at £180K and assured us that they would also be able to find us a smaller property to move into. We liked the idea and signed up, only to cancel the next day when we realised the 4% fee they were asking us was way too high compared to the going rate.
A Drawdown lifetime mortgage sounds like a possible alternative in case my partner decides that Italy is not for her. The disadvantages have already been highlighted (interest might just grow out of proportion); but the advantages are also interesting: we get to keep the house, so that we can enjoy the increase in market value over the next years (assuming this will continue), and have somewhere to stay when we come back to the UK on holiday or permanently, should things not work out in Italy; we release some cash that we can withdraw cautiously on a monthly basis, so as not to increase the interest to be paid back by too much; we pay off the existing mortgage. Am I wrong?