Viewings - Accompanied or not?

Ramouth

Good luck for a smooth sale

74jax

I do my own but I'm an estate agent (or was).  

TripleH

When we sold our flat my wife was there /did 2 viewings and we got 2 offers for the flat from both.

The estate agent did a lot more on their own and we got no offers.

When we were looking round post 1st lockdown we had only estate agents. We looked at several properties with the same person and we felt like we were dirt on the sole if her shoes yet with other agents they couldn't have been more helpful.

My mother exchanged on sale of her home today, its taken 3 estate agents and 5-6 years to sell. The 3rd agent had multiple offers within 3 weeks of it on the market compared to none in previous 5 1/2 years.

Good agents sell a property....

TheJP

TripleH said:

When we sold our flat my wife was there /did 2 viewings and we got 2 offers for the flat from both.

The estate agent did a lot more on their own and we got no offers.

When we were looking round post 1st lockdown we had only estate agents. We looked at several properties with the same person and we felt like we were dirt on the sole if her shoes yet with other agents they couldn't have been more helpful.

My mother exchanged on sale of her home today, its taken 3 estate agents and 5-6 years to sell. The 3rd agent had multiple offers within 3 weeks of it on the market compared to none in previous 5 1/2 years.

Good agents sell a property....

Sounds like maybe the estate agents weren't the problem...

TripleH

For which point @TheJP?

If my parent's house I should add that all windows were replaced just before sold.

I think an issue seemed to be that the same question appeared to come up repeatedly and no answer was given. I'd suggested an info sheet to help but was ignored.

I think my good agents sell a property point was more that they'd either 'spin' things but if the same questions keep coming up you'd wonder why there was no communication to the seller to get answers to questions from them.

Flugelhorn

If I arrive at a viewing and it is the vendor, I tend to think "Oh no" - I find many of them talk too much, go on about things that are not relevant etc - spend so much time being polite to them it is hard to look at the house.

Mind you, you do find some interesting stuff from the really gobby ones.   

Maddest are where the agent is the there but the vendor decides to join in as well... one in Dorset  comes to mind, poor EA - couldn't get a word in edgeways. 

The worst though are where the vendor doesn't want to do the viewings but still is - arrived at one, vendor opens the door and more or less first thing was "oh I hate doing viewings" - we suggested that she got the agent to do them, hadn't realised that this was an option (suspect her agent charged more for doing so ) 

TheJP

TripleH said:

For which point @TheJP?

If my parent's house I should add that all windows were replaced just before sold.

I think an issue seemed to be that the same question appeared to come up repeatedly and no answer was given. I'd suggested an info sheet to help but was ignored.

I think my good agents sell a property point was more that they'd either 'spin' things but if the same questions keep coming up you'd wonder why there was no communication to the seller to get answers to questions from them.

Hi @TripleH i meant was the house its self a problem or your relationship with the EA?

A good agent is worth their weight in gold but also the right house in the right location priced right needs no one to sell it.

TBagpuss

Flugelhorn said:

If I arrive at a viewing and it is the vendor, I tend to think "Oh no" - I find many of them talk too much, go on about things that are not relevant etc - spend so much time being polite to them it is hard to look at the house.

Mind you, you do find some interesting stuff from the really gobby ones.   

Maddest are where the agent is the there but the vendor decides to join in as well... one in Dorset  comes to mind, poor EA - couldn't get a word in edgeways. 

The worst though are where the vendor doesn't want to do the viewings but still is - arrived at one, vendor opens the door and more or less first thing was "oh I hate doing viewings" - we suggested that she got the agent to do them, hadn't realised that this was an option (suspect her agent charged more for doing so ) 

The weirdest one I had was went to view a property with the agent, who had been told that the owners would be out - we walked into the living room and they were sitting there on the sofa. They didn't say anything to let us know they were there , even when we walked into the room - we both got a shock when we saw them as the room set up meant that they weren't immediately obvious.. Which also meant that they had totally ignored the sound of someone letting themselves into the house.!

Also one owner who spent a lot of time talking about what a lovely quiet, peaceful area it was... her house was literally next door to a massive new development where they were building 100 new homes and a supermarket -  she kept having to repeat herself because you couldn't hear her over the construction noise.  It was in the fairly early stages so the likelihood was that you'd be living by a building site for a long time, and of course would then b right by a supermarket car park. 

TripleH

Thanks for the clarification @JP

The estate agent who treated us like dirt seemed upset that we weren't bending over backwards to put in an offer and dared ask irrelevant questions such as status on cladding, the ongoing development works on the site and commenting on the poor finish quality for what were meant to be high end flats in Central Manchester (she wrongly clocked us as having moved up direct from London where the prices being asked for would buy a shoe box in the equivalent location in London.

If there is anything 'unusual' or potential issues about your property I do think a 1 page explanation / preemptive answer to buyer queries makes sense, be it for them or for the Estate Agent.

Swipe

I sold mine last August. Had 30 viewings that were all left to me to do as the EA was so busy. I spent 4 days solid showing people around. Easy money for the EA.