House in West Midlands For Sale - Opinions

Joe-C_4

Hi,

We've had our house on the market for about 8 months now. It's a large country house in the West Midlands on about an acre of land.

The house is up for sale for about £795,000 and in my opinion that would of been a bargain price about a year ago.

It has 8 bedrooms and even a self-contained annex attached to the house where one of our family happily lives without bother. We have huge attics that are just massive 10metre squared rooms.

At the moment we just want to get out but it doesn't look like happening. We've been considering splitting it up into self contained flats but wondered what the process was?

Does anyone have any experience or recommendations?

pink_muppet

do you have a rightmove link so we can have a look?, I have no idea about the option of converting it into flats, what has your ea said? what viewings have you had and what have they said about your house?

Doozergirl

Splitting into flats is a mammoth job. Consider how many flats what they'd be worth and then, if you're using a building contractor then I'd guestimate a charge for the work of not too much less than £50,000 per flat.

Better off doing what you can to maximise the existing value. Perhaps even the planning permission for flats, if indeed it can be obtained, would make the property more desirable to a different breed of buyer. There are a lot of issues like where the property is and the type of area, parking provisions etc that affect the ability to obtain permission. Some LA's in the WM area have complete moratoriums on new dwellings!

If you did have a link to the property it would certainly be easier to advise.

RHemmings

Is that £795K a bargain compared to previous asking prices or previous selling prices? If you give the rightmove link that would help us look into this.

pinkshoes

Given that 90% of the population earn £46k or less, then to buy a house for £800k, with a 10% deposit (£80k), you'd need to earn an annual salary of around £240k, as lenders are only offering around 3x salary at the moment!

Even those earning a salary of £50k are in the top 10%, so unless they have a £650k deposit... Perhaps more likely to be found working in the city??

I doubt it's anything wrong with the house! You're just trying to sell at a time where credit is scarce, bills/food/fuel costs are going up, so people are more wary about spending.

You could try advertising it in London to the rich city folk who might want a country retreat??? I have London friends currently looking for one in the Malvern hills!

Doozergirl

pinkshoes wrote: »

You could try advertising it in London to the rich city folk who might want a country retreat??? I have London friends currently looking for one in the Malvern hills!

At that price, I'd automatically assumed that the OP would be using a prestige agent like Knight Frank but I guess that isn't necessarily the case.

We're using them, not far from the Malverns actually, and we do get viewers from all over the South of England, people who don't even know the area so wouldn't have found us otherwise. It is a big benefit of an agent like that.

It's true that within the local area there would be a limited number of people able to afford a property of that size.

OP if you aren't using Knight Frank or Savills then I'd get them round to have a look.

Joe-C_4

Hey!

The help is really appreciated people! I will study all the advice carefully!

We don't have a rightmove link.

It's actually 5 miles from the Malvern Hills - PM me if your London friends are interested

We will look at those other agents very soon!

rizla01

Just my H'pennyworth but have you considered getting an auctioneer round to value your property?

Obviously not being able to see the property none of us could speculate about its worth but if it was viable to convert into flats then he would be able to advise.

like an EA (They often are) he would also give you a valuation for it, as is.

Doozergirl

Joe - C I'd try Knight Frank in Worcester then! Try and get them down to 1.35%