Selling home, no viewings

suki1964

AdrianC wrote: »

I think you must be looking at the wrong property (or extrapolating from the terrible photos). This is the floorplan from the OP's listing:



Three definite bedrooms, albeit the third is none too spacious.

Sorry but Im with lilElvis on this one

The size of that kitchen and living room does not support a 3 bedroom house. The second living room is now called and being used as a bedroom, doesn't make it so

Its like my house is a way. I have an upstairs sitting room but it is in fact a landing. Just cos I use it as a sitting room, its still a landing as all the other rooms doors lead off it

diggingdude

Unfortunately I think you have the best house on the street, which is great whilst you live there but not when you want to sell it as that street appears to have a ceiling price. The design of house as an acquired taste which many wont buy into. It's a shame as you've done a good job inside.

lincroft1710

I'm sorry but I'm going to have be a bit brutal!

There are 4 things about a property you cannot easily change, its appearance, its outside space, its layout and its surroundings. It is not an attractive house, the outside space is tiny and not inviting, the layout is not great - tiny kitchen and downstairs bedroom and finally all the surrounding houses are unattractive.

Also the bathroom decor is not to everyone's taste.

But the photos are not the best and if the 1st photo is an internal shot, you know the outside won't be great. Also a photo is needed of the other side of the house unless it is really hideous

Retired_Mortgage_Adviser

I'm not sure why some people are saying it isn't a 3-bed, but I agree with diggingdude of it being priced above the "ceiling price" of the street.

That being the case, in your place I would definitely consider commissioning an estate agent for the same rather than PB. You need a sales outlet which has some skin in the game, PB will get its money whether you sell or not, an EA won't.

Just to be clear, I have nothing against PB and have used an online agent to sell a flat but that's in a high demand area in a booming market (at the time) where even a hand written sign in the flat window would likely have delivered a queue of buyers.

PasturesNew

When I sold my house I had 1600 views on RM in the first week without any viewings. The agent said it had been one of their most popular that week and had expected viewings.

It must have been the location and the slowing market that stopped most of them.

I am looking to buy and when I see "offers over" I steer well clear, I suspect I'd think it worth less... so no point. If agents priced it at £170-180k they'd have been shaving £10k off that within 2-4 weeks in a lot of instances, so I'd sit and wait to see if it came down.

As for being refurbished, that often puts me off as I don't like the choices somebody else has made. I figure: I could buy something like that and make a better job of it for £70k by having it done how I'd want it.

You'll just have to wait.... I waited and ended up about £20k under my starting price (suggested by the main local agent who provided sold prices of others similar to back up his figure).

phoebe1989seb

suki1964 wrote: »

Sorry but Im with lilElvis on this one

The size of that kitchen and living room does not support a 3 bedroom house. The second living room is now called and being used as a bedroom, doesn't make it so

Me too - sorry, OP

We've previously owned houses that were * bottom heavy * (one, for example had two bedrooms and a bathroom on the first floor but five reception rooms plus kitchen, conservatory and two shower rooms on the ground floor) but didn't describe them all as bedrooms when we came to sell [STRIKE] although our buyers planned to use most as such[/STRIKE]. It's a difficult one I admit because you don't want to reduce your pool of potential buyers by marketing as a two bed, yet in the OP's case I imagine it was originally intended to be a second reception......

In our case, it had been extended to accommodate two elderly relatives - not related - so two of the ground floor *bedrooms* had basic ensuite facilities. Therefore, iirc, our EA marketed it a four bedroom house and on the floorplan labelled one other reception room as study/potential bedroom five.....

Otherwise, I agree that the pics are poor, presentation is rather *meh* and I'd ditch both offers over and Purple Bricks. It must be possible to get a better outside pic - even at this dull time of year! I also think there are too many pics - when we were selling in 2014 our EA said it's better to give tantalising glimpses of the property so the prospective purchasers will want to look in person to check the place out - but I know a lot of people disagree with this idea.......

Titus_Wadd

We tended to discount "pyramid" houses, often over-extended downstairs with just the original bedroom accommodation upstairs. From the floor-plan alone I'd see it as maybe a dining room used as a bedroom. I never saw a well-executed garage to room conversion either, but for every one with similar opinions there'll be another who finds it perfect for their family.
Definitely go with a local agent as soon as you can ditch PB; have a look at a lot of houses online and pinch their presentation tips. This worked for us, we papered one wall in the kitchen to look better in the photos and painted over a living room paper to "quieten" the look of it. It's fine to have a bike or boxing equipment; just move it out of shot for the photographs. Cheap and cheerful tubs of flowering bulbs will start to appear in supermarkets ( we bought ours from Lidl and had good feedback about our little garden, and got more than a tenner's-worth of positivity by leaving them there when we left).
School's go back this week so there may be more serious interest; the same happens in September after a Summer holiday lull.

hjd

If all you want is a bigger garden why not stay where you are and get an allotment?

kinger101

The argument as to whether it's a two or three bed is a bit of a red herring IMO. While it's not the size of three bedroom home many would choose, some people would buy this if it's the only property they could afford. For example, a family with a son and a daughter requiring three bedrooms.

So marketing it as a three is fine, provided it's a sensible price for your target market. If they can find something larger for the same price within a few miles, then probably not.

Agree with the photos being awful, but you've not long had it on the market. See where you are in a few weeks.

BrOz

I've been on the waiting list for an allotment for 3 maybe 4 years! Nothing has come available sadly. Too many green fingers around or maybe too many small gardens.

I've read very mixed reviews about PB, I chose them because of price but also the EA seemed to have more knowledge on the area, bizarrely, the properties I have been viewing which are literally up the road I was not that impressed with the EA knowledge of the area, even though the offices were based in the area but also their knowledge of the home they were trying to sell eg: I asked when it was last rewired, was told 'don't know but if you look at the light switches they look ok' ... Hmmm, asked a bit more they said they would ring me back when they knew, they never rang me back or asked for my feedback on the property. Trying to book a viewing took me 3 days to even speak to one EA to arrange something and my voicemail wasn't returned when I left one. Just thought online bookings via PB seemed easier. The best viewing I had was when a seller showed me about, she had all the answers to the questions I needed and I felt most nervous viewing a home this way!

I imagine my target market is a first time buyer or someone looking to downsize, most people in the street are single or young / retired couples. There are a few families but not many.