Fitting New kitchen before selling?

Slinky

artyclarty wrote: »

Personally I would kill for a nice 70s kitchen over the bargain basement b&q one that we have in our house...

A NICE 1970s kitchen......... there's a concept I'm not sure I understand! Ours had those fake wood brown cupboard doors, white drawer fronts and metal trims. 20+ years of use and it was falling apart when we replaced it 18 years ago. Dread to think what it would be like now. If I need a reminder, I just vist the garage or shed where a couple of old floor cabinets do service holding junk.

OP if you have time, test the water. If you get feedback saying they'd buy if the kitchen was nicer, from several viewings, then consider doing it.

We saw a house last year we could have offered on, the whole thing had been renovated apart from a bathroom and wetroom, which were tricky looking projects. Owner had decided to leave them for the new purchaser. Only it was on the market for months, and hasn't sold. Owner was a plumber......... if he didn't fancy doing it, I'm not sure I wanted to!

It's been withdrawn from the market, it'll be interesting to see if it comes back with new bathrooms.

POPPYOSCAR

kinger101 wrote: »

I'm gonna disagree with everyone. You need to do this:

Just looking at the picture gives me a headache!

GDB2222

Do you trust the EA 100%? My experience is that they tend to want to take on instructions to sell, and anything that might delay that is not part of their business model.

You are right that buyers stretch themselves to find the deposit and they often don't have anything left over for the kitchen. So, by doing that for them, that extra cost goes on their mortgage, rather than coming out of cash they haven't got.

What you have not said is whether the kitchen is liveable with or really, really dire. However, bear in mind that developers nearly always replace kitchens and bathrooms. There's a good reason for that.

Also, if you are in a position to do the work yourself, you are saving a load of money. Couple that with good-looking but cheapish units (Ikea is my favourite), and the new kitchen isn't going to cost a fortune. Units and worktops probably cost under £1000. You could perhaps save a bit by keeping some of the old appliances, depending what they look like.

GDB2222

tlc678910 wrote: »

Hi,
In your situation i would simply think "how much will the kitchen cost?" e.g. 6K and then "will it add more than this to the sale price?" ' which sounds doubtful.

If at the moment you would hope to achieve 205k you would need to be looking for 212k with a new kitchen that cost you 6k - if you won't get your money back and a premium why would you bother?

Some people would need to do the work to help shift the house at all but it doesn't sound like that is the case for you. Just explain you haven't done the work because you expect the new buyer would be likely to want to extend the kitchen like the neighbours have.

Tlc

If they are doing the work themselves and get Ikea units, won't it cost far less than that, though?

AndyTails

GDB2222 wrote: »

If they are doing the work themselves and get Ikea units, won't it cost far less than that, though?

Yes, probably. DIY with B&Q or IKEA units, don't replace the appliances, and you can probably do a kitchen for about £3k. (That's what it cost me when I did mine. For personal use though, not as prep for a sale.)


How much will a £3k kitchen affect the price of the house? Not at all. So if it's not needed, that's £3k (and a lot of effort) down the drain.


For some houses it will be needed in order to get the sale, i.e. if there's lots of competition from perfectly finished houses, if it's a slow local market, or if the target buyer is someone who doesn't want to do work. But the EA has suggested it's not necessary, and their justification makes sense to me.

kilby_007

Could you do the kitchen yourself? We put a breakfast bar in ours, added a few cabinets and replaced the sink, a couple of doors (cleaned up refinished the old ones), re-tiled and painted. Total cost was about £1500 and I do believe we probably re-couped the money. It was good enough that you wouldn't need to replace the kitchen for another 10 years or so and it was quite neutral (solid oak shaker doors, black worktops). It sounds like you've had everything done bar the kitchen, so why don't you do something neutral as cheaply as you can? I wouldn't spend much more than a couple of grand though, as you won't re-coup that cost, so if you're going to have to get people in then I wouldn't bother.

kilby_007

kinger101 wrote: »

I'm gonna disagree with everyone. You need to do this:

The orchids are a welcome splash of colour in that kitchen.

katejo

Don't replace your kitchen. As long as it is workable and doesn't have cupboard doors hanging off, I'd be more likely to buy it as it is. Then I could choose my own kitchen. I wouldn't buy a house with a new budget quality kitchen which I didn't like. When I bought my house, it had an old 80's kitchen and I eventually saved up and replaced it with a decent mid range price one which has lasted well so far.

toddler9

Thanks everyone. Seems like the overwhelming verdict is to leave as is!

I'll try and upload a picture later to see if the consensus is still the same haha. No, in fairness for a kitchen which was fitted in 1972 it is in immaculate condition!

M.E.

We shall be moving from our 80's house. Should we renew the work surface and paint the doors? We know the kitchen will be ripped out because that is what they do with houses near us, even those with kitchens that were renewed before sale.
Same with the carpet? Which is still in very good condition after 30 years (top notch Axminster!)