Why don't EAs put on floor plans - laziness ?

Section62

Ms_Chocaholic said:

I rang them and they said it would be on there by Wednesday of that week - it's now 2 weeks on and still not on but price reduced.  Maybe if they'd put a floor plan on it might have sold aaaargh! Laziness?

Maybe they think that people who are really interested in buying the property will go and view it rather than relying on a floor plan?  You get a much better feel for a property seeing it in the flesh, so for me the floor plan would be a nice-to-have, but not a deal breaker.

It might be more important if the property is in an area a long way away making viewing more difficult, but again perhaps they think serious buyers would be in the area regularly viewing other properties, so in effect the lack of a plan could be acting a bit like a filter (as well as saving the EA/buyer time and money).

peterhjohnson

I would not sell a property through an agent that didn't do a floorplan from day one. When buying, I look at the floor plan very early in my screening process. It very quickly identifies:

•  kitchen/diner or lounge/diner?
• Only WC is on the 2nd floor!
• Is the 3rd bedroom really a dining room?
• The sq ft total gives an idea of size and may explain why it's cheap/expensive
• Where does the front door open into
• Is the garden door sensible - or is it in a bungalow bedroom?

Flugelhorn

peterhjohnson said:

I would not sell a property through an agent that didn't do a floorplan from day one. When buying, I look at the floor plan very early in my screening process. It very quickly identifies:

•  kitchen/diner or lounge/diner?
• Only WC is on the 2nd floor!
• Is the 3rd bedroom really a dining room?
• The sq ft total gives an idea of size and may explain why it's cheap/expensive
• Where does the front door open into
• Is the garden door sensible - or is it in a bungalow bedroom?

saw floorplan the other day (2 bed bungalow) - they were describing it as 3 bed and listed the living room as living room / 3rd bedroom. floorplan was very helpful clearing that up 

davemorton

I think it largely depends on area.  Where I live it it most unusual to see a floor plan listed. 

movilogo

It is sheer laziness. There are free software available to create floor plans. Sometimes they show floor plans without room dimensions and total floor space areas. Rightmove does not allow to search houses by floor areas - so that I can discard smaller houses and select the larger ones. Funny that in UK people measure size by bedrooms and not by square meter or square foot.   

Section62

movilogo said:

It is sheer laziness. There are free software available to create floor plans.

Is the software free for commercial use? Do the developers provide any form of warranty regarding the accuracy of the software (particularly for commercial use)?

The cost of the software to produce plans is not the real issue.  It still takes time to draw the plans and check them for accuracy.  Time which might be better spent talking to vendors/buyers, closing deals, getting new business... in other words things that generate revenue.

You call it "sheer laziness", other people would call it focussing on the things that drive profit... if there was more profit to be made from including a 'free' floor plan with every property you can be sure the EA's would be doing it.

movilogo said:

Rightmove does not allow to search houses by floor areas - so that I can discard smaller houses and select the larger ones.

Have you asked Rightmove to correct this obvious flaw?  What did they say?

movilogo said:

Funny that in UK people measure size by bedrooms and not by square meter or square foot.

Generally because people's property purchases start with (approximate) location and then having the rooms required for their family and/or lifestyle choices.  If you have three teenage children there's no point looking at 'large' properties which only have two bedrooms.  Conversely, searching by 'larger ones' might eliminate properties with the required number of bedrooms in a compact form.  Typically people are more willing to compromise on room size than they are with the idea of sharing bedrooms.

user1977

davemorton said:

I think it largely depends on area.  Where I live it it most unusual to see a floor plan listed. 

Whereas around here it's quite rare for there to be no floor plan. It would be a brave EA to dispense with them when all of the competition is providing them:

https://espc.com/properties

jrawle

There were some good tips already about using Rightmove to look at previous sales, or the layout of similar houses nearby. Another trick is to search the local authority's planning database. If the house has been extended or had has any work done to it, there will likely be a floor plan attached to the planning application. You may also find a floor plan for the property in the original planning application from when it was built (perhaps less likely the older the property).

lookstraightahead

Or floor space? Why leave this off as it's incredibly important 

Gavin83

peterhjohnson said:

I would not sell a property through an agent that didn't do a floorplan from day one. When buying, I look at the floor plan very early in my screening process. It very quickly identifies:

•  kitchen/diner or lounge/diner?
• Only WC is on the 2nd floor!
• Is the 3rd bedroom really a dining room?
• The sq ft total gives an idea of size and may explain why it's cheap/expensive
• Where does the front door open into
• Is the garden door sensible - or is it in a bungalow bedroom?

I agree. Floor plans are one of the first things I look at when considering a property and I’d consider them more important than photos. It’s easy to misrepresent in photos, harder to do so on a floor plan.