How quickly did you sell your house?

[Neon]

Any did you have to lower the price stupidly?

Our house is tiny.. We paid 85 and have seen similar houses going around here for much less.
It needs lots doing to it - there's a hole in the ceiling where DP put his foot through about 4 years ago and we have a baxi boiler, tank etc. It's really small. In fact the only thing going for our poor house is that it's in a fantastic location with stunning views.
Since having DS and one on the way - its full of crap!! I spend my whole life decluttering.

I just don't know where to start - our mortgage ends in a year but we are willing to default on it..

BUT - we've seen the house of our dreams and it's a bargain.

Is it possible to start the process in time to catch the house and how low do you think we would have to go? How do you find cash buyers etc?

[ginmakesitallok]

Can't offer much advice re the selling- you just need to make sure your price is reasonable. But, I would strongly advise against defaulting on your mortgage if you ever want to get another one. Don't see how defaulting would help anyway?

[eviscerateyourmemory]

What would be the point in delauting on your mortgage at this stage. you just need to pick a realistic price. If you are just desparate to sell then what is the lowest you could afford to let the house go for?
The state of the house might not be that important if the location is very special.

[Neon]

Are you saying we should stay until the mortgae ends? I was hoping we could take the mortgage with us and just pay a fine for changing it?

[eviscerateyourmemory]

Yes, you should be able to move your mortgage, sorry, I thought that you were suggesting defaulting on it.

[Neon]

I thought that was what defaulting meant . Hmm. Well - I was wondering in the current market if you just have to make a loss to sell. A neighbours house has been on the market for well over a year and is on for around £75 although it's a different type of house/cottage..

[eviscerateyourmemory]

You might have to sell it for less than you paid for it. If your mortgage has nearly been paid off then presumably you have a lot of equity in the property, so you may be able to afford to sell it for less than you paid and still move onto the new house that you like.
Have you considered getting in valued? Even if it isnt in a great state of repair if it has a good location it may suit someone looking to develop property.

[yomellamoHelly]

Can't quite remember what our old house was on for - but £15-20k more than we wanted. Settled for £7k below asking price and sold after 10 days. 18 different people viewed, 13 offers (a couple silly). Our offer was accepted day we accepted an offer. Everyone happy. Just think you need to be realistic. (Had done massive de-clutter though so house looked huge/great.)

[LawrieMarlow]

Our house sold within 3 weeks. We were advised a range of prices from different estate agents - went with our own price (higher than lowest valuation) with the estate agent who valued it highest. Think we were a buy lucky - there's a house in that village that is still for sale a year later.

[twinmumplus1inthetum]

Ours sold in an afternoon. We put it on for £25k less than the estate agent suggested (they will often suggest an inflated price, just to get the business). We did research and looked at what was on in the area for similar prices, then made sure ours was the 'best in class' as it were. We painted rooms that needed it, fixed the fence etc.
We got the asking price, as the buyers felt it was correctly priced and shouldn't quibble.
Much better to start at a realistic price than have it on too high then have to drop the price.

[GnomeDePlume]

We recently renovated a bungalow and accepted a reasonable offer around 3 weeks after it went on the market.

My top tips for selling

• consider your market, who would buy your house? A builder wont be worried about the damage as that can be repaired. A first time buyer may well avoid it as being unsure how to deal with it.
  
  
• de-clutter more. If you have children then get in the habit of putting their toys into boxes/tubs then hide them for viewers. The same can be done with your own clutter
  
  
• twinmum is absolutely right about price, be the best in your price bracket.
  
  
• consider how your house will appear on rightmove. Look at the price bracket you will fit into.
  
  Good luck, everything can be sold at the right price.

[innertiger]

an estate agent friend says that the only reason a house doesn't sell is price.
We are about to go to the market and have decided to put it on at a slightly lower price than valued as the estate agent says this will generate more interest and in current market they have had a number of houses which have then had 4 of 5 interested buyers and gone at a much higher price.

[Lcy]

Our house in the same price bracket as yours sold in a week six months a go. We spent two weeks before hiding everything in the loft and painting the entire house white, prof cleaning carpets, washing windows etc... Lovely neighbours helped. We then bought down just a few nice paintings for the walls and about half the kitchen stuff (very minimalist so it looked bigger). We then chose the most friendly estate agent with the best website. He spent a lot of time taking photos and came back a different day to get a sunny shot of the house. I showed people around myself and made sure DD was out at a friends. I told people how happy we were here and about schools, community, views, neighbours etc... We priced a couple of thousand above what we wanted so people could haggle us down a bit.We got two asking price offers in a couple of days.

I would get a few estate agents round and tell them that you want to sell quickly and get them to give you some advice about what you need to do to the house to get a quick sale and ask for a sensible valuation.

[mrshotrod]

Just sell first, before you get bogged down in anything else. Too many headaches and heartbreak over houses you've imagined being home otherwise.
Twinmum right about getting the price right.

[SchnitzelVonKrumm]

Do you mean that you will have paid off the mortgage in a year, or that your fixed-rate deal ends then?

[noddyholder]

We sold to the 1st viewers 2 weeks ago but the house needs no work and I think the location is what they wanted most

[mumzy]

Sold the day it came on the market, in fact it never made it onto the websites for full asking price. We are in a property hotspot but agree with other posters it's about getting the price right for your house and area, we've spent a year monitoring prices in our area and found the overpriced ones hanging around for ages but the good ones priced reasonably go within days. If your house has a big compromise: near noisy road, awkward layout, dodgy area you need to take this into account when pricing. As a rule of thumb good properties in hotspots are commanding prices just slightly below the 2007 peak whereas poor properties or places with a weak economy are at least 10% below that.

[maryjoe2]

I would like to suggest you that don't sell your property for less.Just look for a good cash buyer,they will surely pay you which suits your requirement.Or get what ever you have so that balance with your present dream home price.

[iseenodust]

5 months. Put house on market in June. Had a number of viewings leading to some silly offers. One lot keen but had not yet got own house on market. The keen ones put their house on market and we sold to them at 95% of asking price, completed last month. They sold to 1st time buyers.

[RCheshire]

All about price. Sold two places within the last 18months:

• 1st one: rejected a 'silly' offer 15% below asking. 12 months later accepted a 'fair' offer for the same amount. Funny how perceptions change
  

• 2nd one: priced about 10% (20K) below identical houses on the same road which were sat there unsold for a year (& still there!). Sold within about 8 weeks.
  

Have never listened do EA valuations. As someone else said, an EA says what they need to say to try and get your business. Do your own research, it's not hard.

People who can afford to be flexible on selling price fall into one of two categories:
- want to sell and drop the price until it gets a buyer
- aren't terribly bothered about selling so advertise for an aspirational price hoping someone will come along who falls in love with it.

[bumbez]

We sold our house after 9 months in the spring having dropped the price twice.

Our house was completely up together, we hired storage and cleared out a lot of our clutter, we also touched up some paintwork.

Once you have got used to something you stop noticing, I would definitely sort out your hole in the ceiling it won't cost as much as what someone will knock off the asking price. Good luck :)

By the way we put our house on the market to buy our dream house and despite the long time to sell we still achieved it.

[EIizaDay]

This is an old thread that has been bumped (for some reason)