Can any estate agents advise on selling my cluttered house

[TheThinWhiteDutchess]

Myself and family are in a position whereby we have outgrown our house and need to see if we can move to a bigger place.

Unfortunately with myself and DH working and two kids the house is pretty cluttered. It's kind of embarrassing but not on a horrific level.

I'd like to get a valuation on the house to see if it's even feasible to try and sell up bit will an estate agent even come and take a look if the house is looking a bit shabby and cluttered?

We had our flat valued when rather cluttered and disorganised. Obviously we were advised to declutter and we did before having photos taken etc.
We also asked if it was worth replacing the (functional but tired) bathroom before selling, but were advised against it as it was unlikely to add any more in value than it would cost & it wasn't bad enough to hinder a sale. There was only one loo (1 bed flat) so would have been pretty disruptive for us too.

That sounds good. What I'm hoping is that an EA will come over and give us a valuation and then based on that we can decide whether it's worth doing some SERIOUS decluttering to get it sold!

(I am slowly decluttering anyway but it's a slow process.)

Put as much stuff in labelled boxes and temporarily hide in the loft/shed/garage.

My main motivation for decluttering was "do I want to pay someone to move this?". It does help!

We are never going to be minimalists - I like being surrounded by books, DH has lots of musical instruments and equipment - but I didn't want to pay to move stuff only to chuck it at the other end.

My biggest tip for presentation for photos or viewings is take your own photo of the space and look at it - for some reason things jumped out at me in photos that I completely ignored when in the room.

Don't be afraid to move stuff as the photos are being taken - our mop & bucket lived in the bathroom (small flat, no storage) and the hoover was just in the hall - I moved both for the photo to be taken then put them straight back

Get a professional declutterer in.

It's pricey, depending on how long you need them for, but it'll save you having to move it to a new house, and will help to attract a better first impression and valuation from the estate agent.

It's a life-changing experience, it was for me. My lady came for 3 days and we powered through so much in that time. The mantra is 'do you love it, is it useful, and does it have a place'. If you can't answer yes to two of those then out it goes - charity/ebay/bin.

My biggest tip for presentation for photos or viewings is take your own photo of the space and look at it - for some reason things jumped out at me in photos that I completely ignored when in the room.

Yes. This.

I do not understand how it works but a photo shows the flaws that I appear to be blind to.

As long as the EA can see roughly the size of the rooms, condition of kitchen/bathroom, they should be able to give you an estimate.

Of course you can mention that you will declutter ahead of the photographs/viewings, but they care more about the condition of the stuff you wont be taking

Mumsnetters can also help give advice on presenting rooms if you ever want to share pictures.

Be better than coming back after it's been on the market for months asking for tips on how to present it/why it's not selling.

Not that I'm saying will definitely happen here, but that if theres going to be advice, best to get it and implement before photos/listing.

Watch a few episodes of Sort Your Life Out on BBC iPlayer. I always get motivated to declutter after I've watched an episode.

My main motivation for decluttering was "do I want to pay someone to move this?". It does help!

Nailed it.
If you move, all that STUFF is going in a box. So you put it in a box NOW or you put it in a box later

I would declutter and deep clean before inviting the agent in. Chuck out all the stuff you don't need or want, everything broken that you'll never mend, all duplicate things, clothes outgrown or outdated etc. All the stuff you intend to do 'one day' that you haven't looked at in over 5 years. Get rid of it all. Then scrub the house inside and out and invite agents round. I bet you'll get a better valuation. And it will be far easier to stage for photos and viewings, as well as easier to keep clean.

I would start with your child’s toys. What have they outgrown. Take it to a charity shop.
Next do your own clothes. When I downsized I got red if everything which no longer fit me and everything apart from sentimental items, which I had no worn in the last 2 years.
I still had stuff which had never been unpacked from my last house move, it all went.
I don’t like clutter though.

My biggest tip for presentation for photos or viewings is take your own photo of the space and look at it - for some reason things jumped out at me in photos that I completely ignored when in the room.

So true. Have you noticed how alien your home looks when you see it in estate agents photographs?

When we sold our last house, we rented a storage unit and moved loads of stuff into there before we put the house on the market. It was a very small terraced house so this really helped and made it look much better. If you don’t have the time to declutter now, this could be worth doing instead.

Some amazing advice here, thanks all! I like the idea of taking photos and looking at it. I will definitely do that. I know there's no judgement here but I'm not yet comfortable posting photos!

Easiest fix fo this is to get a removals firm in to remove about 50% of your clutter and take it to a storage facility. They will pack it and move it. You stick signs on what they don't take.

Then you tidy up your house for sale

And you go to the storage space you are now paying additional fees for and sort through your crap quickly!

It really puts me off when I see houses on rightmove looking really cluttered etc. Makes me think the house was unloved and brings forward questions as to what else has been neglected.

Definitely de clutter as much as you possibly can.

The good thing about decluttering is that you can fo tiny chunks across many many days and it all works towards a good end result.

Waiting for the kettle to boil? Go through all the mugs. Pick 6 or 8, box up the rest.

Brushing your teeth? Grab/look in storage in the bathroom and bin/bag for charity any old unopened lotions that you know will never get used.

Dusting? Pick one shelf that you strip everything off and only let yourself put 50% back on. Box up the rest.

I'm not an EA but I have worked with many as I regularly buy , sell and move
Most EA will be keen to come to value and market the property for you as it is just to get you on their books but really you need to consider the buyer before you do this

You mostly get two types of buyers ....

Type one who want a nice clean tidy functioning house - there can rarely see past the shit and need every room clearly defined

Type two who want a do it upper and expect to get a property that's needing work and pay accordingly ( as low as possible ) can usually see past the shit and are going to do a lot of alterations but expect to pay less for the property in the first place

To get best buck
Declutter to within an inch of its life , viewers cannot see past clutter and rooms look much much bigger with less in them , on right move photos the clutter will put off people wanting to view , you could store stuff that you really will need and use again but its expensive long term , as you declutter try to get shot of as much as you can , ( if I got a bit stuck I used to hold it in my hand and ask myself " do you want to move to a lovely new property or do you want to stay here with this gruesome item ?")

If you paint anything , just keep to white , if you use white paint it makes for clean and fresh , and also makes rooms look lighter brighter and bigger

Currently it's mid to late November so realistically you could do an awful lot to your house to make it look much better between now and the end of January , that gives you approx 10 weeks , ready to sell early spring and although people will still look over Christmas unless you are in a rush it would make sense to prepare properly - declutter , clean and update where you can ready for the the new year influx of buyers

Before you have an EA round to value know the rough value by looking for similar on right move ( ones that have sold within the last 6m to a year ) as at least 3 agents to value , choose EA's that sell similar property as yours in your area , ask locally for recommendations , then after valuations go with the one you feel you can work with best

Lots of folk here have given you good advice 😀

For extreme decluttering, I read the following advice...
Decluttering is HARD because you are sifting through stuff trying to decide what to throw out. It's a very negative experience.

Be radical.
Take everything out of a drawer / cupboard / shelf.
Say "everything is going out APART from these few things that I want to keep"
You sift through the mess, picking out what you really want to save, it's a positive experience because you are saving what is really important.
Eventually you get to the tipping point where you say "right, bin what's left"

Ours was seriously cluttered when we got it valued. It was quite funny watching the estate agents try and say politely "get it tidy and less cluttered" to us. We put them out of their misery and told them it looked worse because we were clearing.

But also we found good ways of hiding things during viewings/photos. You can fit a whole load of washing under a duvet and all that happens is the bed looks higher. Our ironing board fits beautifully under the sofa etc.

I think you will get less if its cluttered. Maybe you could do it a bit at a time. I've decluttered alot by moving twice in two years. I was determined that I wasnt going to pay to move stuff to then declutter the other end.

I gave away all the stuff we were not using apart from sentimental stuff.

There's some amazing advice on this thread, thank you! I think I will try and declutter as much as humanly possible in the next ten weeks and see about a valuation end of January.

We put stuff into storage. That was much quicker than trying to de clutter.