Doorsteps.co.uk

NineDeuce

Hi. Does anybody have any experience with the website http://doorsteps.co.uk/

Please could you provide information and how they compare to a high street estate agent and other online agents such as Purple Bricks. Many thanks.

JoJo1978

Which package are you considering? The most basic one would leave you needing to do a lot of tasks yourself.

I've not used them but was just looking at their website and comparing to the service we've got from our traditional EA.

Get more than one valuation before you decide on an agent. Most EA will do that for free with no obligation.

NineDeuce

I dont mind which package. If the more expensive one is worth then fine. £199 seems like some deal given the costs of conventional agents.

How can they get to be so cheap? Is there something I am missing?

JoJo1978

Ok, am only going on limited personal experience and second hand experience. But there seems to be an element of getting what you pay for wrt service:

As a buyer I've used PB to book viewing but not to offer (didn't get that far). Pros: convenient Cons: direct messaging with vendor, personally I hated that for very early stage in buying process.

There's a current thread on here about someone else's buying experience with PB who did go to offer stage, with reading. This may be the experience you are letting your potential buyers go through.

We met our solicitor recently and were talking in general about how house transactions may change over time. Online agents came up and they commented that dealing with online agent-appointed solicitors wasn't their favourite thing (slow, and the clients couldn't be in control of the chasing they had to go via their online agent account manager.)

Have only ever used traditional agents for buying and selling, doing so right now and it's a nightmare for various reasons. The advantage of hight street agents has been that they've been able to help sort out multiple problems very quickly. For example our agent called in some favours to get tradesman out to our place on the weekend so that exchange deadline wasn't missed. Our sellers agent walked round to the solicitors to ensure a piece of paper got to its destination. And also spent hours on the phone to each of us when our transaction started to fail. I'm just not sure that you'd get the same from an online agent.

00ec25

there was a BBC article about Doorsteps pointing out how big they have become so quickly

what is brutally clear about them is you get what you pay for and you pay extra for anything that is not specifically part of the headline rate. Just look at what is missing from the headline £99 plan - no photos, no description , no floorplan. Now read any thread on here about "why is my house not selling" and you will see the same themes time and time again: poor photos, no floorplan

on the £199 deal that does include then, how good do you think the "instant online valuation" will be when the small print says it is based on "local analysis" yet by definition they have never seen your property and are not local so cannot do anything other than a sweeping broad brush 3 bed in Harpenden is £X approach, yes you may be 3 bed, but the comparison ends there.

obviously they are selling property otherwise they would not still be in business and the owner won't have been eulogised as a young multi-millionaire, but you get what you pay for....

ElBeanio

I feel quite differently to some of the comments above. I've bought and sold several properties in the past and have often felt frustrated by how little value estate agents add, while charging a handsome sum. I prefer to take my own pictures and write the description (I mean, how half-arsed and badly written are most property listings, and how many estate agents, at least in my area, don't bother with a floor plan!?) You can commision an EPC for about £60 from a surveyor with an extra £10 for a high-quality floorplan with area stated (which should be standard on any property listing yet many estate agents don't arrange to have it provided).

I've done all this, but frustratingly, was unable to list on the all-important Rightmove to get traffic, just because I am not an estate agent. Doorsteps have solved this problem for me and I'm very happy!

Had a chat with one of the managers before signing up and he sounded on the ball and flexible to my needs (arrange viewings myself to avoid delays, but leave feedback taking and negotiation to them, as it helps to have a bit of distance there).

I appreciate not everyone is as experienced and comfortable with property transactions as I am, so it's horses for courses I suppose. We'll see how it goes in reality... I'm about to sign up and will keep you posted!

betsie

We are buying a house that is on via Door stop. When I phoned to book a viewing it took the girl 15 mins to find it on the system. Viewing booked then got email to say cancelled and to call to rebook. Did this, turned up for next viewing and no one showed (house empty). Knocked next door and she contacted the seller and we then dealt with them directly. Doorstep had not informed them of a viewing.
If you do go with them I would give any people who view your direct email to deal with you that way from that point on. She had only had 2 viewings in the 4 months prior to us buying it and we live in a popular area with good schools. Also once you sell you won!!!8217;t have anyone to find out what!!!8217;s going on if you are in a chain or their are any delays. The EA we used to sell ours has really been working hard to keep the chain below us moving and keep us informed. Without this it may have all fallen apart already.

I would also say it depends on the type of house your selling if it!!!8217;s a FTB property then probably ok as you won!!!8217;t have a chain but if you are a few steps up the ladder it may be hard work. Also depends how desperate you are to sell. You can always try it for a couple of months and if it!!!8217;s not great switch to a traditional EA.

googler

NineDeuce wrote: »

I dont mind which package. If the more expensive one is worth then fine. £199 seems like some deal given the costs of conventional agents.

How can they get to be so cheap?

By only doing a small subset of what a conventional agent would do.

doorsteps simply puts you on websites, without visiting your home, having any presence in your area, or even travelling to your area.

conventional agent visits your home to assess its value against other sales in the area, and, more crucially, against their knowledge of what failed to sell, or took a long time to sell. doorsteps won't know any of this

conventional agent based in your area will know about the area and can promote it to buyers. doorsteps won't.

conventional agent will have physical office to promote your property, doorsteps doesn't

conventional agent can actively match buyers with sellers, doorsteps won't

etc
etc

diggingdude

not doorsteps but this is an example of where doing things cheap doesn't pay off http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-72082946.html

thethirdbar

The house we're buying was marketed by doorsteps. Booking the viewing was hassle free (compared to one local EA who: scheduled us a viewing for the time we had specifically said we could not do; and then when informed of this rescheduled for a different time... But completely the wrong address!). Our viewing was conducted by the vendor, but then so are many traditional EA viewings too.

Email and phone comms with the agent when making our offer were efficient and straightforward, seemed a really friendly and great service - though we did offer asking price so no negotiation needed, I was pretty happy with the whole thing ...

However, our vendor has since done nothing to move the purchase on and the online EA having pretty much done his job no longer seems part of the transaction! Reading so much on this forum about how valuable an EA can be in chivvying the chain along, I do wish I had that option available rather than having to basically stalk the vendor directly for updates

victoriavictorious

diggingdude wrote: »

not doorsteps but this is an example of where doing things cheap doesn't pay off http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-72082946.html

That listing above is pretty shocking and really, the vendor should be complaining loudly about it, but this is certainly not typical of every online agent.
We recently sstc with a different online agent and the photos they took could not be faulted. They also did a good floorplan.
We chose to write our own description but even if they had done it, we still had the option to edit it and add our own photos; as it was, we didn't need to.
The quality of service you get with online agents can be as variable as with local agents, some good, some bad. Our particular experience with our chosen online agent has been very positive, but then we are not first time sellers and already knew how the system works. We would not have chosen Doorsteps because we wanted a level of service somewhere between being entirely on our own and that offered by a local agent; there are several online agents who fulfil this criteria very well, but they do charge around £800.
That said, even the very best online agents use automated systems and are not set up to provide as much hand-holding as a local one, hence the lower fees.
These systems are efficient, but tend to be *re*-active, rather than pro-active (and less likely to fight your corner/save the sale than a decent High St agent, should things not go smoothly) so maybe a less-confident novice seller would be better off going the conventional route, at least the first time they sell.
It's all down to whether you feel it is worth having to undertake a lot of your own work (with a less robust support system if things don't go to plan) in order to save several thousand pounds in fees.
We did, but as with most things, it's up to the individual to do their own research.
EDIT
Forgot to add, all our viewers remarked on how easy it had been to book viewings. We also had the option to pay extra for accompanied viewings, but chose to do them ourselves.