how to sell my property in U.K?

[Guest leizabrown]

Hi ,

 

I am new in this forum, my name is Leiza, resident of North London. I need to pay off my mortgage debts but I am currently going through rough time. Well wishers suggested that I should sell off my home, which I bought 11 years back. I know in present condition this would be one of the best options.

 

For the past 7 months, I am trying this but all in vain. Estate agents keep promising to help me sell my property quickly but its been almost 6 months and we haven’t seen anything concrete happening.

 

Classified ads to sell property in open market so far has resulted in just 1 response and that too was frustrating as the buyer was ready to pay just half the price of my equity in the home.

 

The burden of paying mortgage and my sporadic income are taking their toll. I am frustrated and I need some good and quick advice on how to sell my property in U.K.

[Guest The Cutches]

Hi Leiza and welcome to PIO.

 

Unfortunately there are many people on this site (including myself, who have been trying desperately to sell their houses for months. Other than taking a big hit on the price, there isn't gonna be much else you can really do. The good thing is that the housing market usually improves in the spring and looking at the stats, things are starting to pick up. Is your agent on rightmove cos I think that is a must.

 

Fingers crossed, I hope you find that elusive buyer real soon!

 

CC

x

[Phoenix]

In my opinion Estate agents in this country are a disgrace, they charge a lot for doing just about nothing, and most of them work off the stack em high philosophy, they don't give a damn which houses they sell in any given month just so long as they sell their quota. and all too often they will overvalue a house knowing it will sit for months on their books, or maybe someone will be dumb enough to pay that price, and then when the seller is completely despondent, magically produce a buyer at a much lower price, with some lame reason why its a good offer!

 

There are few more things you can do besides just wait for the estate agent to produce that magical buyer

 

1) change estate agents, if your current agent is not performing then give them the elbow

 

 

2) appoint more than one agent, you may have to pay a higher rate for a multi agent deal, but if you only pay that on a sale then it may not be a big loss, plus with two competing agents they both have an incentive to actively SELL the property rather than leave it gathering dust somewhere

 

3) advertise the house independently, the days of estate agents may be dwindling, the last time I bought a house I did all my research online and only contacted the agents after I found places of interest, I think it high time sellers started adopting a DIY approach, and there are plenty of web sites now that cater for this need.

[Guest alfixie]

Here Here Phoenix,

 

I could pour wine over my cornflakes when thinking about estate agents, say no more!!!!!!

 

Good luck we all need it.

 

Regards,

 

Marina.

[Guest taylorandrew]

Leiza, I am not sure if you are aware of the current status of UK property markets. The market at present is sluggish. The turmoil in equity markets, fears of a global economic slowdown and speculation about interest rate cuts are keeping potential buyers in wait-and-see mode. Home prices have also slipped and the average time to sell a house, as reported from a survey by Housetracks, is now approximately 8.5 weeks.

 

Weak confidence in property market by would-be potential purchasers is the main reason

for your almost zero response from classified ads and poor show of service by real estate agents.

 

If you are actually burdened and need to sell off your house quickly then you should rather approach private investors or cash buyers of property. If you sell your property to them, you can close the deal within 28 days or even sooner. Their service differs from the services of real estate agent as they do not simply serve as the facilitator between purchaser and seller but they actually buy your property. They even take care of the mortgage balance on your property and give you the option to rent your property back.

 

If you do not have any plan to leave the country or area, you can stay sell and rent back in the same house from them. Now surf net to find a cash buyer for your property and hopefully you should be able strike the deal within a day or two.

[Guest julie2g1b]

Leiza, I am not sure if you are aware of the current status of UK property markets. The market at present is sluggish. The turmoil in equity markets, fears of a global economic slowdown and speculation about interest rate cuts are keeping potential buyers in wait-and-see mode. Home prices have also slipped and the average time to sell a house, as reported from a survey by Housetracks, is now approximately 8.5 weeks.

 

Weak confidence in property market by would-be potential purchasers is the main reason

for your almost zero response from classified ads and poor show of service by real estate agents.

 

If you are actually burdened and need to sell off your house quickly then you should rather approach private investors or cash buyers of property. If you sell your property to them, you can close the deal within 28 days or even sooner. Their service differs from the services of real estate agent as they do not simply serve as the facilitator between purchaser and seller but they actually buy your property. They even take care of the mortgage balance on your property and give you the option to rent your property back.

 

If you do not have any plan to leave the country or area, you can stay sell and rent back in the same house from them. Now surf net to find a cash buyer for your property and hopefully you should be able strike the deal within a day or two.

 

hi there

 

we looked into this option and you have to be really desperate as rang about 6 people our house is valued at £179.000 they all ofered to buy the house for £125.000 and would not offer more so i think you can quess what i told them all.

i dont mind dropping the price down but not by that amount how desprate i am.

 

julie :wubclub:

[sykestykes]

Hi Leiza

 

Have you had a look at houseladder.co.uk? It's not much to register your house for sale, there are different levels of marketing available at incremental costs depending on the level you choose, I know a few people who have sold this way and i must admit I'm tempted to go down this route myself with all the costs we'd save. :idea:

 

Good luck.

 

Mrs Tyke x

[immy21]

In my opinion Estate agents in this country are a disgrace, they charge a lot for doing just about nothing, and most of them work off the stack em high philosophy, they don't give a damn which houses they sell in any given month just so long as they sell their quota. and all too often they will overvalue a house knowing it will sit for months on their books, or maybe someone will be dumb enough to pay that price, and then when the seller is completely despondent, magically produce a buyer at a much lower price, with some lame reason why its a good offer!

 

There are few more things you can do besides just wait for the estate agent to produce that magical buyer

 

1) change estate agents, if your current agent is not performing then give them the elbow

 

 

2) appoint more than one agent, you may have to pay a higher rate for a multi agent deal, but if you only pay that on a sale then it may not be a big loss, plus with two competing agents they both have an incentive to actively SELL the property rather than leave it gathering dust somewhere

 

3) advertise the house independently, the days of estate agents may be dwindling, the last time I bought a house I did all my research online and only contacted the agents after I found places of interest, I think it high time sellers started adopting a DIY approach, and there are plenty of web sites now that cater for this need.

 

 

 

So the credit crunch and world economic slowdown were triggered by Foxtons:shocked:

Phew did n't know us Estate Agents were that influential. I know we boil babies and like the Vikings go a rapin and pilaging but are we the reason that Jo Public is not parting with his money at the moment! I think not!

Your house is not selling because despite the fact we have very modest interest rates and high employment it is actually the popular press that influences weak minded Jo Public.

Estate Agents in the UK have the lowest commission in the the world (do some Reserch don't take my word) Example Spain 6%!!!!! Australian agents take a higher commission (part of the attraction for me) Agents don't overvalue to let houses sit on their books for months we 'stack em high and sell em cheap' both your comments, so which do we do???

Property owners dictate value they call in 3 agents and more often than not go with the highest quote influencing agents to overvalue to play to vendors GREED!

 

If you want your property sold and I'm selling two of my own at the moment you HAVE TO REDUCE and like me today make the place look gorgeous!

Sentiment is controlling the market but it is improving as buyers come back with the Daffodils be patient and work hard to sell don't just sit back grumbling get on the phone to the agent and gently push them. My flat is on with 3 agents and I'm now on my third buyer fingers crossed it goes through cos then we can book the flights and removals.

Getting to Australia is proving very hard i've been trying for two years:arghh:

[Guest the chambers lot]

Hi leiza,

 

I really feel for you having to rely on estate agents to in effect help you realise your dream. We are nowhere near that stage and i just remember when we bought this house 2yrs ago how stressful it was then and we only moved down the road.

I don't know what agent your with or whether you have them in London but we have used Entwistle Green who were fantastic with us. They rang us a few times every day and after every viewing rang us with feedback from the viewer which helped us decide if we needed to change anything. sometimes it's a simple thing you might not have thought of.

 

Hope it happens soon for you

Louise x

[Guest roma 1]

hi we have sold several houses in the last 17 yrs and the best way we think is to change agents if you are unhappy with them. also someone on pio said don,t tell them you are emigrating as they will try and push the price down. estate agents can be hard to deal with but be forceful. good luck:)

[Guest Ben and Toni off to Oz]

Hello Leiza,

 

Time to do some research - you need to go to rightmove.co.uk - put in your post code and see what price your house is on compared to all of the other houses in you area of a similar size and then drop you price by 10k beolow theirs... then get a new estate agent.... then put as much of your stuff as you can into storage (garage or friends homes) so that you don't have any clutter whatsoever when people come to view your house... this will make your house look bigger and more appealing.

 

Selling you house is a competition - we did this exactly the same way. Our neighbours have been on the market for 6 months and we sold in 6 weeks....luckily they also now have a sold sign so everyone is happy, but the principle remains - make you house beter than everyone else'.

 

Good luck - i really feel for you x

[Guest wardy]

We have had 3 agents in to price nothing between them to be honest except when we looked on Right Move couldnt find one of the agents listings.

 

Haggle on the fees the lowest we were quoted was £1500 our house is valued at £200k the highest fee quoted was £1900. We managed toget all fees down to £1250 when we rang to tell the 2 agents who we didn't want, that their services weren't needed one of them instantly came down to £800.

 

Also I didn't want a long exclusivity deal the one we were going to go with had a 16 week lock in the one we are now going with said he would do it for 6 weeks or whatever we wanted.

 

All have said they could sell our house quickly (we will see) but we got the agents fighting between themselves to sell it which has been good for us.

 

I will watch very closely the agent we have chosen just because I am getting a cut price deal I will still expect a great service or I will give him the boot.

 

I am a hard nosed business woman. :biglaugh:

 

The whole process costs such a lot of money so remember to haggle and tell them what you want, and don't sign anything until you have read the contract also tell them if there is something you don't like don't be intimidated.

[racht]

Hello Leiza,

 

Time to do some research - you need to go to rightmove.co.uk - put in your post code and see what price your house is on compared to all of the other houses in you area of a similar size and then drop you price by 10k beolow theirs... then get a new estate agent.... then put as much of your stuff as you can into storage (garage or friends homes) so that you don't have any clutter whatsoever when people come to view your house... this will make your house look bigger and more appealing.

 

Selling you house is a competition - we did this exactly the same way. Our neighbours have been on the market for 6 months and we sold in 6 weeks....luckily they also now have a sold sign so everyone is happy, but the principle remains - make you house beter than everyone else'.

 

Good luck - i really feel for you x

 

I wholeheartedly agree with this. Weve moved several times in the last few years and have just accepted offer on ours yesterday after putting it on market less than 2 weeks ago. Luck was on our side (right person and right time and all) but you can help .... think of your house as a showhome and if you wouldnt see it in a showhome, hide it! Instruct a new agent, and good luck x

 

PS Just as well our viewers didnt open wardrobes, they would have been covered in a mountain of rubbish!