House Selling - Money Saving Tips

ingleg

Hi

Our property is valued at about £80,000, and we are told by a couple of estate agents that the fees will be £2000 + Vat, as this is the minimum fee and no negotiation on it.

Does anyone have any advice on whether this is true or not, are they fixed or shall I try to negotiate the fee down, and what is a realistic fee to aim for?

Thanks in advance.

Steve_xx

ingleg wrote: »

Hi

Our property is valued at about £80,000, and we are told by a couple of estate agents that the fees will be £2000 + Vat, as this is the minimum fee and no negotiation on it.

Does anyone have any advice on whether this is true or not, are they fixed or shall I try to negotiate the fee down, and what is a realistic fee to aim for?

Thanks in advance.

It looks like they want to charge you about 2.5%. I'd say that this is average. You could try and negotiate it down, or you might try for a fixed fee instead of a percentage of the 80,000 asking price.

You could put it with more than one agent and this I think gives an agent more impetus to sell as they are aware that they may do work and not get paid at all if they are not proactive.

You might consider trying to sell it with an online provider. Most buyers these days will look online I guess.

WOLODOMYRE

WOLODOMYRE wrote: »

Can someone tell me what i am best doing. Really really want to move from my house but cant afford to do the work i think it needs to sell it. To get it into a decent state to sell i reckon i'd have to spend a good £3000 - which i just do not have. I also cant afford to have the house sitting on the market for god knows how long and having to pay money for it just sitting there.
Should i go with one of these quick sell companies to just get rid in the condition its in at the moment, are there reputable ones out there.

I just cant see an alternative as i cant afford to get the house into a fit state to sell and without doing a major home makeover i cant see anyone wanting to buy it.

So yesterday we had YourMove out for a valuation(which seems a bit pointless as they say now its what the home report says is the value), anyway after looking around and having a chat we said realisticly we would like to sell for £60k which she said yup thats definately doable, she said if we did the work needed(actually not as much as we thought), that it would be worth she reckoned £65k to £70k. Great, left us feeling v hopeful.
An hour later we had Remax in and complete opposite! She said she reckoned home report would show house is worth about £55k to £58000 and if we were wanting £60k then not to sell!

So now we are completely stumped!!

thesoldier

Marcus your an absolute gem. I have been phoning around this morning and I am waiting for phonecalls back from the EA managers themselves.. lol..
About the 1% and no lock in. Do I ask for that in writing then before I start the process otherwise its my word against theirs?:beer:

BizzleBozzle

WOLODOMYRE wrote: »

So yesterday we had YourMove out for a valuation(which seems a bit pointless as they say now its what the home report says is the value), anyway after looking around and having a chat we said realisticly we would like to sell for £60k which she said yup thats definately doable, she said if we did the work needed(actually not as much as we thought), that it would be worth she reckoned £65k to £70k. Great, left us feeling v hopeful.
An hour later we had Remax in and complete opposite! She said she reckoned home report would show house is worth about £55k to £58000 and if we were wanting £60k then not to sell!

So now we are completely stumped!!

If I were you I'd get a couple more EAs round to value your house - preferably independent ones. Don't tell them what the others have said or what you would like to get. Hopefully they'll then give you a realistic idea of what your place is likely to sell for.

Look on Rightmove at similar size and style properties and see what their asking prices are and look at what condition they're in compared to yours. Also check out Zoopla for Sold prices in streets with houses like yours. Sometimes for more recent purchases you can see what the asking price was and when the property first went on the market.

Armed with all this information you should put the house on for a little less than you think it's worth (if you still want to sell). Hopefully this will encourage people to take a look.

clarej1956

We also had a bit of a nightmare with estate agents. We had three come round and they gave very different valuations. I think this was based on whether they were looking for a quick sale or trying to win our business by convinicng us they could achieve a good price.

After nine months using two of them, we decided to try and sell privately. I know gumtree do this, but a friend recommended comparethehouses, which we found really good. There were some guides and links on valuations and I think we were more realistic with a valuation when not influenced by agents. It was also completely free so we ended up saving quite a bit of money too.

I think the housing market really badly needs ideas like this.

Hope it helps anyone.

Clare

JulesR

Marcus wrote: »

Greetings all. I’ve been using this site for a while now and have managed to save us a small fortune. Years ago I was an estate agent so I thought I’d see is I could write some bits and bobs in relation to my experiences in the hope that it might save people some cash.

Selling Your House

Methods to Save Money

1) Agents Fees
a. All Estate Agent Fees are negotiable. First, check through the local property paper. See which agents get the most business. Are any members of the NAEA. Busy agents who are members of the NAEA would be my first choices. Select the best 3 or 4 agents and phone them up as potential buyers. See what service you get over a week or so as a buyer - that way you’ll get an idea of how they will market and present your property. A good proactive, busy and well managed agent will still have time and resources to post/email you details and phone you with new properties.

Then get them all to Value your property. Tell each valuer that you have other valuations (BUT NEVER TELL THEM WHAT VALUATIONS OTHER AGENTS HAVE GIVEN YOU - AS THEY’LL MANIPULATE THEIR OWN VALUATIONS) and that you are looking for a fee of 1% with no lock-ins. Most agents will try to lock you in - so that if you instruct them to take your property off the market you will not contractually be able to re-market with another agent for up to 8 weeks (especially with corporates). Make sure you get this down to 1 week after written notice. If you are locked in and you then sell your property through another agent you will get sued for the fees.

Agents are sales persons - they will give you great reasons to lock you in and charge you more... but they also need your business - thus you have the power to ask for and get these things.

b. Once your property is up for sale keep an eye on your agent - mystery shop them ie call them up, give a false name etc. and tell them you are looking for a property that matches your own property’s description - see if they push for you to view your property - are they positive and energetic?

The Duel/Multi-Agency myth.
If you become unhappy with your agent’s efforts it may be time to sack them or go multi agency. Tell an agent that you wish more than one agent to market your property and they’ll try and push up the fees to staggering amounts (2.5%+!!).
Tactics - tell your current agent that you wish for other agents to market your property. Tell them that you’ll keep them as an agent only if they will keep your fees at 1%. If they will not, then sack them (you should only be locked in for a week). I’ve never known an agent not to back down in this situation - they’d lose potential business if they let you go.
Now go to some other agents - probably the other agents on your original list - and tell them that “my agent has agreed to let me go multi-agency and my current fees are 1% - would you like to also market my property at 1% multi-agency?” You can guess what the answer will be...

A 1 % saving on the average cost of a property in the UK (currently £150000) will save you £1500 before VAT.

Duel Agency means you’re marketing with 2 agents - multi agency means you’re with more than two. Agents will try and charge you more for either of these - especially in the case of multi.



2) Solicitor Fees
During you initial enquiries with estate agents, ask them for several recommendations each of good conveyancers or solicitors. You don’t just want the name of the firm, but also the name of the specific solicitor/conveyancer. Remember, some agents will have ‘arrangements’ with some solicitors and some will even have their own - so be warned. A good rule of thumb would be to approach solicitors (by name) who have been recommended by different agents - although some solicitors will have arrangements with more than one agent.

Phone the best solicitors and ask for written confirmation of their charges. Take note of how they treat you - do they speak in plain English, are they friendly and do you get their details as promised the next day. And once again - their fees are negotiable - there’s no reason not to ask your favourite contender to shave £xxx off of their fees if you have evidence of more competitive quotes from other solicitors... they may say “no chance” - in which case you need to make a decision as to whether or not the extra charges are really worth it.

A solicitor can make or break deals for you so shop around. It’s very hard to change solicitors once they start the conveyancing process for you... and it will cost you!

And finally - avoid fee busting corporate conveyancing firms - they will most likely slow down the conveyancing process - these are normally call centre and internet based firms. They can save you as much as £500... but as stingy as I am I would never use them.



I hope this is of use to you and I hope that my info is still correct.
I’ll see if I can write something for buyers when dealing with agents and the like.

Regards
Marcus

:T Really useful advice and totally agree as I am now close to completing my sale asnd many of your points matched my experiences

Judith_W

Can someone explain the tie-in period? I have heard 8 / 12 weeks, but Marcus says no tie-in. Basically I want to give an EA a reasonable chance of selling but if they're rubbish canning them for someone else. How does it work - can I get them with no tie-in, or short tie-in, or would it be a notice period?? So confused.

dazsylv

can you still sell a house to a family member for say a £?
Parents want to sell a house to Son just to give son the house rather than in a will ?

Steve_xx

dazsylv wrote: »

can you still sell a house to a family member for say a £?
Parents want to sell a house to Son just to give son the house rather than in a will ?

Yes I think that they could do this and it will be regarded as "lifetime gift" by HMRC. If the son has it for seven 7 years before the parent dies then no inheritance tax would be due, but if the parent died within 7 years of the gift then the value would be deducted from the inheritance tax threshold/allowance I think.

Check this link for further clarification:

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/inheritancetax/pass-money-property/exempt-gifts.htm