Selling a McCarthy and Stone Apartment

Crashy_Time

mljdamvp wrote: »

Just accepted an offer of £180k :-)

How much did you buy it for?

Crashy_Time

mljdamvp wrote: »

Hello,

Has anyone else had problems selling a Mcarthy & Stone Retirement Apartment, myself and my sister have received the apartment from our late aunt in her will back in August 2017, the apartment has been on the market since then and we have only had one viewing and no offers despite the apartment now being listed at £100k less than was paid for it.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated as really need to get the apartment sold?

Also, has anyone tried an estate agents called retirement move to sell there retirement apartment, if so are they any good?

How much....?

silvercar

I have merged 2 threads with very similar titles.

lisyloo

bouicca21 wrote: »

I think it varies from development to development. From what I have gathered from friends, some are incredibly difficult to sell, others turn over very quickly. I suspect it has to do with what facilities are available outside the development and how walkable it is to get to them, but the ‘sample’ is way too small to be definitive!

I sold a retirement flat recently and it sold very quickly (2 days before going to market) and completed largely without issues (rubbish solicitor further down the chain was a pain but unrelated to the flat sale). The main reason it sold quickly was that it was a 2-bed and there are fewer of those. Incidentally it went to a single person. There is nothing wrong with that just noting there is a demand for the larger flats from single people as well as couples.
It was not a McCarthy and stone.

buglawton

Interesting to note that at a brand new Mcarthy & Stone development I've seen recently there are only 2 & 3 bedroom apartments and parking spaces exceed flats.

At the root of the value retention rot is the total lack of regulation of leases and service charges on what is actually a local monopoly situation. It should really be the local authorities that regulate this, especially as it's they who give the privileged planning permission out in the first place. That planning permission cuts the cost of land = profits.

And the regulation needs to have demonstrable teeth as in, new service management companies can be appointed and leases can be forcibly amended if there's misconduct. Plus regular auditing of management company accounts.

It's the lack of this accountability that'll keep the boomer generation in their multi bedroom family houses till they croak. Most of them are too smart to buy an asset that depreciates like a used car and to have no control over it's management.

lisyloo

Why is it a local monopoly.
There are generally older style retirement flats available (like the one I sold).
These do have service charges which are obviously higher is you have facilities such as pull cords, guest room, full time manager etc.
But are not anywhere near the rip-off of McCarthy and stone.

It’s a bit like complaining about buying a new build.
You don’t have to where there are second hand homes available for sale.
We just like shiny and new don’t we?

Larac

Personally would not buy a 'new build' retirement flat - the ones in my late Mothers complex all took a massive hit to sell. 2 Beds first sold at £360K and now being marketed at £200K and will need to go lower as there is yet another retirement complex built with new shiny flats - 2 bed £359K. We eventually sold after 16 months and took a slight hit on the original SP as she brought at the time of the crash. You don't get a large number of viewings and in our case were competing with 7 other empty flats for a sale. Whilst their empty the service charges continue to rack up and CT becomes payable and doubles after a year.

Crashy_Time

Larac wrote: »

Personally would not buy a 'new build' retirement flat - the ones in my late Mothers complex all took a massive hit to sell. 2 Beds first sold at £360K and now being marketed at £200K and will need to go lower as there is yet another retirement complex built with new shiny flats - 2 bed £359K. We eventually sold after 16 months and took a slight hit on the original SP as she brought at the time of the crash. You don't get a large number of viewings and in our case were competing with 7 other empty flats for a sale. Whilst their empty the service charges continue to rack up and CT becomes payable and doubles after a year.

Ouch.....!

CampingCathy

mljdamvp wrote: »

Just accepted an offer of £180k :-)

Good news, and I'll keep my fingers crossed for you that henceforth all goes smoothly (unlike our experience with McC&S):

We had an offer accepted in October from a vendor who is buying a McCarthy and Stone apartment. We were ready to proceed on our purchase in December.

Our vendor however is experiencing significant delays with the "management company" providing copies of the lease(s) and their failure to respond to queries. Despite being chased by the two estate agencies involved and both sets of solicitors, nothing is forthcoming. They are aware that we have started looking at other properties, and despite knowing that we may withdraw (and hence the chain will collapse), nothing has succeeded in moving things along.

I really hope that you do not face any similar such delays in your sale

retirementmove

Retirement Properties are hard to sell - i work for a specialist retirement Estate Agent - it is a niche market and whichever agent you use needs to target the right type of buyers. Let me know if i can be of help.