There can be no doubt now – as the indices below show – that the property boom is over. Asking prices and completions are down and new-buyer enquiries are falling at the fastest rate since 2004, says the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. So with fewer buyers around, how can you raise your chances of selling your home?
Tidy up
One estate agent tells me she frequently ends up doing washing up and tidying away laundry before she takes photos of a property. A buyer wants to see the property – not what you had for dinner last night.
If your property has been on the market a while, consider having new photos taken. Repaint your front door (or clean it up if it’s UPVC) and tidy the front garden – often buyers don’t even bother to look at the house if the garden is a mess.
Don’t do too much DIY
While a lick of paint can help with a sale, don’t get carried away. With house-price growth slowing many buyers believe renovation work is the best way to add value to a property, so they’re looking for properties they feel they can upgrade. As a result, one of the main areas experiencing a slowdown in sales is new-build homes and properties that already have a shiny new kitchen and loft conversion.
But you can make your home more attractive to these fixer-uppers. If it has the potential for a loft conversion or extension, consider getting the planning permission. Do remember, though, that while this will attract buyers, it probably won’t entice them to pay more – after all, they could do it themselves and may not be planning on doing any work for years.
Drop the price
Make sure your asking price is realistic. Find out what similar properties in your area have sold for. Check the Land Registry for details of sale prices by post code. Don’t just go by local asking prices – the house around the corner might be pitched at £500,000, but it may have been on the market for months.
Also, if your home has been on the market for three months, then reassess the asking price. Even if the initial price was perfectly reasonable, the market is not what it was in August. With mortgages more expensive and harder to come by, people can’t, and won’t, pay what they would have paid in the summer.
Choose your estate agent carefully
Get a couple of estate agents round to value your house, but don’t just go with the highest valuation. Estate agents know that this the best way to get a property on the books, so sometimes overvalue a property just to ensure they’ll be representing it.
Check in estate agents’ windows and see who sells the most houses that are similar to yours, and once you’ve chosen a firm read the small print. The average fee is around 1.5%, but some agents charge various hidden fees, including – and this is the worst, given the current market – withdrawal fees.
So they will lure you in and take a fee for putting you on their books, then if they fail at their job and your property remains unsold, they will charge you as much as £400 to take it back off the market.