Selling: How to choose an Estate Agent?

Chelsea__Thomas

I worry about reviews of Estate Agents - never know if they've made them up themselves!

dc197

Chelsea__Thomas wrote: »

I worry about reviews of Estate Agents - never know if they've made them up themselves!

I'm sure they do. You can generally spot the fake ones though, as you can on all review sites.

dc197

One more thing.

Look at the agent's listing on rightmove and their own website. This will give you a feel for their quality.

Do they rush the listings so that they go live with incomplete or naff information? For example, no floor plan; zero, one or just a few photos, missing descriptions of the rooms, missing dimensions of the rooms, incorrect map pins for the location....

Do the descriptions contain meaningless stuff such as "Sought-after location of Snotsville"? Do they all sound the same, e.g. all starting with "XXX Agents are delighted to offer this beautifully presented ...." or all ending with their high recommendation to view it?

Do they use capital litters or other techniques to highlight features?
"The house features a KITCHEN and at least one BEDROOM"


The website listings will give you a window into their professional nature, their honesty and accuracy, and more importantly their attention to detail.

pathtofreedom

I went with a local estate agent. They don't have a physical shop which keeps overheads down, but they are on rightmove etc. I looked at other current listings and they had very good descriptions, photos and floor plans. Also as they are small they made a point of explaining they would do viewings any time, they answer their phones in the evenings too so if someone wanted to view eg after 5 or on sundays. The big chains don't normally do viewings in the evening or on sundays. When I was looking for somewhere to move to, this meant I missed out on viewing a lot of properties, as if they were all booked up already for saturday and closed on sunday that was it. So those people selling missed out on the chance of me wanting to buy the place.

It also depends in the area you live in, where I live currently things take a year to sell, so this local estate agent offered extra services like house doctor style presenting of a home to get the most out of it. If you live in an area where something sells the day it is on right move, no matter what the pictures look like, then extra services like that might not be worth considering.

Most high street estate agents will also negotiate on their fees with other physical shops. They can't compete with internet / no shop stores but if you get quotes varying from 1-2% you can always try and use this to reduce the cost even if they aren't a big chain.

Understanding the term your signing up for is very important as well, and if you own the floor plan or pictures if they don't sell. You don't want to get tied into a 6 month or indefinite contract if your in an area that isn't selling well right now, if you want to stay with someone that long, then that is fine, but you don't want to end up paying more than one set of fee's if you realise later they aren't doing enough to market your place. You don't want to have to pay twice for floor plans etc either if you can avoid it.

walwyn1978

Some excellent advice in this thread.
+1 for looking on their website. Anyone who markets without floor plans, without decent photos (eg a random shot from a funny angle) should be avoided - if they do it with someone else they'll do it for you.
If any estate agent when you first ask about a property on that fact finding visit tries to push you in the direction of their friendly in house mortgage broker, consider ditching them straight away - their business is basically about being a middle man to the broker and thus they'll not be working for you, they'll be simply trying to get anyone in who'll sign up for their mortage offer regardless of whether they're the best prospect.
Just because their agents all drive round in branded Mini's or Fiat 500's doesn't mean they're successful.
Any agent that when they come round to visit the property makes any kind of 'guarantee' 'oh, I guarantee we'll have this sold within 8 weeks (or whatever)'. No, you can't, you have no way of knowing that. Agents who are more realistic will say 'if we price it at X, which is undervaluing it, we can move it in *so many* weeks, but if you're happy for a longer process, we could price it at Y, which is going to be a longer sell but potentially a higher return, etc'
An agent who once they've priced it asks you straight away what your minimum acceptable offer will be has no intention of getting anything above that - if it's priced at 199k and you've said you'll accept 180k, magically all offers will be around that mark. It's not worth his time to get a few extra K as he won't see enough return on it for him/the agency - so he'll move it quickly at the lower price if he can.
Walk around the area - if there's lots of boards up for an agency how many of those are sold signs? If an agency has lots of local properties, have a look at them online - are they much better than your house? If so, is the pricing similar to what you want? Agencies with lots of similar properties in a small area have more choice to offer prospective clients, thus lessening the chances of your house being chosen.

seven-day-weekend

Chelsea__Thomas wrote: »

Hi All,

I wondered how everyone chooses an Estate Agent to sell their property?
Any advice?

Thank you!

We chose the local independent agent who is known for selling the 'better' properties (not necessarily the most expensive, just well maintained and cared for properties). They were the same price most of the other local ones. We thought it would give our house kudos.

Don't know whether it did, but it sold quickly and they were very helpful.

always_sunny

walwyn1978 wrote: »

If any estate agent when you first ask about a property on that fact finding visit tries to push you in the direction of their friendly in house mortgage broker, consider ditching them straight away - their business is basically about being a middle man to the broker and thus they'll not be working for you, they'll be simply trying to get anyone in who'll sign up for their mortage offer regardless of whether they're the best prospect.

I am a buyer (trying to) and it happens!!!

cloo

I've sold two places and I'd say long-established and local has been best both times. The first one we went for a big chain and they were useless, securing only one low offer in what was supposed to be a roaring market - we ended the contract with them and went to the local guys who immediately secured 5 offers, the one we accepted in the end being significantly higher than the one we got from the previous agent.

Prothet_of_Doom

I suggested to my Nephew, who is an estate agent negotiator, that I'd be impressed if there was a different type of contract.

Say I think my house is worth £100K. If you sell it for £100K you get 2%. If you sell it for a penny less you get 1%. But for every £100 above £100K you get £50, so if you work really hard and find someone that will pay £105K, you get 2% of the £100K - £2K and 50% of the £5000 - £2500. Of the £2500 80% should go to the employee who negotiated it in commission.
But only if you find a buyer within an agreed timescale.