Moving House

[Young Pretender]

We're about to put ourselves through the process again which means talking to estate agents  It would be good to gauge your opinions on something..

 

1.  If you see a house priced at £170k to £190k do you assume that you can pay the lower price (or less) or expect to pay in the middle somewhere?

2.  Would you sell with the estate agent that takes the lowest percentage or take any other factors into consideration?

 

Cheers

Mark

[Mark (smokey mow)]

1. I would guess that depends on a number of factors, including the value of other properties on the street, their financial situation, how much you actually want that property, the state of the market in that area and whether you mind being stiched up at a later date if you go in low and somebody comes along with a better higher offer.

 

2. I'd sell with the one which would give the best visibility in the market place for my house.  If you have a house that everyone wants and at a good price then I guess it's not a problem but if the market is slow in the area then I'd be looking for a good set of photos taken by someone half useful with a camera and advertising both online and in the papers etc.

[ajpearson]

IMHO if I saw a house advertised from £170 I would always go in lower, and try the waters.  Expect a 10% knock for an opening bid is was I was always told.

 

As for Estate Agents, like anything cheapest is not always the best.  You want to be looking at foot fall, reputation, reliability and a gut feeling with them.  When I sold my last house, my estate agent turned out to be a lying cheating swindle, but luckily he got his cumupance (spelling?)

[Young Pretender]

I guess I have fairly strong views on these points but wanted to get a feel of broader opinion.

When I said "£170k to £190k" I meant advertised as a range like that rather than a specific price. Hope that makes sense.

One estate agent seems to think that if you are selling use a price range to get viewers through the door but he reckons that they often sell in the middle of the specified range. Personally I think that's rubbish. I think buyers will fixate on the lower price and still expect to pay less. Unless they REALLY love the place.

My view on the second point is that Right Move, Zoopla and the like sell properties nowadays and estate agents are just a bunch of swindling, lying, cheating middle men that arrange viewings and often manipulate negotiations to their benefit. I feel that the fluffly brochures, advice on de-cluttering and local paper adds don't add much value. On that basis I would go for the cheapest agent that I felt was the most personable.

Anyone think I'm way off the mark?

[Mark (smokey mow)]

The problem I have with rightmove is that unless you search for a specific type of property in a particular price range and narrow locatron radius then it it returns 100's of properties that take ages to scroll through in the results.

 

Newspapers and estate agents windows draw your attention to properties that may be outside of your search criteria and catch the attention of people who may be thinking of moving but may not necessarilly logging onto rightmove each week.

[pickmaster Andy Lowe]

Beresford and Adams are not cheep pushy but they got good prices and quick sales for us on a couple of houses

I don't like going in there shops or the pushy technique they use

But it's all about the quick sale for a good price

[iain m]

The price difference is supposed to attract buyers with the lower amount to spend, everything revolves around getting the Rightmove and Zoopla advert with the price in the lowest price band, at £170k they believe people with £170k to spend will not look at property above their limit. This is how Agents think, I always look prices above my price limit and negotiate down which I suppose they think they are doing for you. Unfortunately in the present market someone expecting the highter price is going to be faced with offers below the lower price.

[Norman Verona]

my estate agent turned out to be a lying cheating swindle, but luckily he got his cumupance (spelling?)

 

 

Same experience here. They seemed to be working for the buyer not me. In fact I suspect they were in collusion to get the property cheap.

 

They did get their comeuppance as I didn't pay them and even though they kept asking they went broke. The receiver tried to get payment and threatened legal action. I wrote setting out why they weren't getting paid and if they sued I would counter claim for my losses.

 

That was 6 years ago and haven't heard anything since. 

 

However, I think you need them and let them place on the net. BUT, if it doesn't sell in about a month they seem to lose interest. Unless in these hard times they are better.

[s2rrr]

The clue is in the title "agent" that means charges. Do your homework about prices in the area, are the houses moving. The house may be on the market for a million but has been for 10 years as the price is ridiculous. As in our case, if the house is the one you really want then you may be prepared to pay an elevated price. Its all about supply and demand I would guess that prices are restrained at the moment due to financial constraints it may be a good time to snap up a bargain. Very much area driven but don't listen to "agents" too much, there are others interested, the price is going up tomorrow etc etc every trick in the book. I guess by now you will have picked up my dislike of estate agents, they go in the same box as bankers and stock brokers ( all financial institutions )

 

Bob

[Dommo]

I'm looking at the moment, and if there's one thing that annoys me about online adverts, it's when there's no floor plan! That's going to be a specific requirement of my agent when my place goes up for sale.

[Mark (smokey mow)]

I'm looking at the moment, and if there's one thing that annoys me about online adverts, it's when there's no floor plan! That's going to be a specific requirement of my agent when my place goes up for sale.

If they either can't do it or would charge too much for them, then they're easy enough to produce yourself.   Several of the estate agent's round here use a piece of software called Floorplanner, the free download is enough to produce the plans for one house.

http://www.floorplanner.com/

 

The floor plans in this thread were done in that way, and as a novice it takes about 1 hour per floor to draw

http://forum.wscc.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic/98201-why-you-havent-seen-much-from-my-narrow-rebuild-lately/?p=1003322

[iain m]

We live in the Sussex downs where 3 villages with a total  population of under 15,000 have 11 shop front Estate Agents and a further 2 just with web sites. Property price have not reduced greatly in recent years but the average propery will take 12/18 months to sell and be "under offer" several times for several months because of the dishonest claims by buyers. Now " Cash Buyer" means my house under offer but I have 100% negitive equity and inable to get a mortgage for your house. " On the market" means I know what the house next door fetched 2 years ago but not spoken to an agent yet." First time buyer" means love to buy your house but no deposit and unable to get a mortgage. Tough times I know, the market up to recenty averaged 50% upsize and 50% down size, perfect combination, now its only 20% that can afford to upsize which leaves 80% of the older generation in larger homes nothing smaller to move down to which b*****s everybody up. Mortgages used to be for life like getting wed after 5/10 years there was considerable equity to move on with and you were considered a safe investment, with modern practice a mortgage is two years and then encouraged to take out the equity to use as disposable income, brilliant idea if you never intend to move!! 

[SootySport]

1. Never understood the Price range bit, I did offer some years ago the lower price on the house I live in now and the estate agent told me the vendor would not be interested at that price. I eventually bought it £20k. below the lower price but thats a long story.

I can't think of a better place to search for houses than Rightmove, all the estate agents list houses for sale, the others have just about nowt on them.

2. As for selling get 3 written values for your house and their commission, you can always bargain on the commision side like anything else. Go with the middle valuation as you "Asking price". Bit like selling a car only higher numbers.

[s2rrr]

Every house I have sold has taken less than a week, probably due to realistic pricing, timing of sale and not fannying about with greedy agents whose sole purpose is to convince you that you can get more money that the place is worth. Well they may do on odd occasions but then they do get a cut of that extra and its not there own money that is being wasted is it.

 

Bob

[iain m]

The agents in our area give you a valuation as high as possible to get your business then after a couple of weeks try beat the price down to probably less than market value to get a sale.