Vendor viewings - good or bad?

MartiMcfly

I've never purchased from a seller direct. I hate it to be honest, but it could be I've just been unlucky - pushy sellers telling me their life story and having to pretend to smile while I look at their awful handy work....

I would use an online agent, the figures are too good, but pay that extra for hosted viewings, A friend did this and it was only a few hundred quid, still thousands cheaper than an estate agent.

McTaggus

Ours was purchased through an online agent with the vendor conducting viewings - the vendor was awesome, however - not pushy in any way, and just showed us the property and left us to our own devices but available for questions later when we sat down and had coffee and cake to talk about the house some more! It all depends on the vendor, however, I think…. Ours were lovely - had they been like parts of my extended family, I probably would have run a mile

mrsmazza

Nothing worse then viewing a house you really don't like and the vendors are showing you round. At least with an EA you can just say No not for me and leave quick

ellie27

Yes, in Scotland most viewings are carried out by the vendor and its only when a house is unoccupied that the agent would do it.

I done all our viewings when selling our home too. I would show viewers around the house, then go out the back garden or something and give them time to go round the house on their own, telling them to feel free to open any cupboards/windows etc

A vendor knows more about the house than any agent will. I have found vendors to be more open and honest when asking questions too.

We used an online agent and they negotiated for us, and we sold for a price more than the high street agents advised us to market the house for!

bigfreddiel

As long as both let you wander around on your own it makes little difference.

Handy to have the vendor to answer questions.

Handy to have the agent for his opinion.

That's how I see it

Cheers fj

oligopoly

We;ve just gone with Purplebricks - their £800 is significantly less than the 1% quoted by local EAs (by over £2k!). I was bamboozled by the EA's pitch that the location of our house is in such high demand that she would have no problem selling it - she'd be able to find a buyer straight away as there's always people looking. So why would I pay £3k for the privilege!?

I'm aware that EAs do a lot more than simply finding a buyer, but so far we've had a few viewings and the viewers have been friendly. I like doing it ourselves - we can point out the main sales points, answer any negatives and allay any concerns.

Give the viewers space to look around and offer a cup of tea and you're all good.

nkkingston

We've gone for the house where the vendor showed us around. Much easier to imagine living there, knew the actual answers to questions like "what are the neighbours like?". and no hedging on difficult questions or hard sell. Of the other places we looked at, all of which had agents showing us round, were a bit of a mix. At least two agents gave the strong impression that we were impinging on their time and wanted rid of us as soon as possible, and how dare we ask them questions and actually expect them to know the answers. Another was great, but a poor listener (couldn't grasp that neither of us drive), while a fourth was solid but stuck with trying to sell a not great house.

Brightspark87

Hi! I am buying (FTB) and I HATED being shown around the one house by the vendor it really put me off. Basically I had a list of questions I normally asked and I didn't feel I could ask some of them directly. It was all a little bit awkward. Also, as it was an online agent they were asking for serious £££ (we are talking £75k over a similar property I am now buying) and it had been on the market for over 6 months. Now, I might be the exception but seriously think about the fact that a good agent made us offer the asking price and within 48 hours haivng previously been let down. For me that makes them earn their 1%.

TBagpuss

I think it depends on the buyer, the seller and the local norms. I personally prefer to go round with the agent on a first viewing and then perhaps with the seller for a second viewing.

It can be very uncomfortable having the seller there, particualrly if the house is not what you are looking for.

As a single woman, I did also have one viewing which was very unpleasant as the seller came across as really creepy - I'm fairly robust when it comes to dealing with that kind of thing but it did make me wary (of course, an agent could be creepy, but I think there is less risk as it's likely to affect hteir job prospects!)

As a seller I never did any viewings.

The other thing which I found, which surprised me, was how many people wanted viewings during normal office hours - I did most of mine at weekends as I didn't want to take time off work, but nearly all of the people viewing my house wanted to come during the day, in the week. So depending in your own work patterns and availability, doing your own viewings may be tricky if your availability doesn't coincide with the viewers.

If you want feedback, I think that peope are more likely to give honest feedback if they are asked by an agent than if it's you as the homeowner, as it is more obviously a business relationship.

But I think an awful lot depends on the agent. I've had bad and good viewings with agents. (And one memorable viewing where the agent had told me that the seller had changed the time and date, had not told the seller I was coming at all until the morning of the viewing (I'd spoken to the agnets on Monday, booked the vewing for Friday afternoon. I got a call from the agents on the Thursday changing the viewing to Saturday morning. The agents told the sellers about it at about 9.30 Saturday morning, and had not spoken to them about a Friday viewing at all.

The sellers were nice people, so we bonded over how crappy the agents were, but the house wasn't any good for me - if I'd been with an agent I would have ben in and out in 5 minutes. In that case, I did give the seller some feedback because the issue which meant I wasn't interested would have been obvious with better photos, so I simply suggested that they get a couple of extra photos.

visidigi

I prefer the vendor route - estate agents are from the same bucket as car salesmen.

A vendor is interested in the right price and the right buyer.

An estate agent is interested in their cut. Once its 'sold' they move on.