Are Estate Agents necessary?

[Mayflower282]

So I saw another thread about purple bricks being rubbish and it got me thinking, are estate agents even necessary? If there was a website like Rightmove that anyone could put their property up for sale (instead of only allowing estate agents to), people are so familiar with selling stuff on eBay/fb marketplace etc. I found it infuriating having to deal with estate agents when I was selling a house, would have been so much easier to arrange showings myself. What does anyone else think? Are they worth the amount they charge? Could you do it yourself and save thousands?

There are several other on-line EAs you can try, if that is the way you want to go.
I suspect a high majority of people now are used to being able to "walk through" the house on-line first, so that is a half way house between employing an EA and just sticking a board outside your house.

I would have agreed with you, but I have just moved and my EA really made their money. It was a big chain. I sold and then had to find somewhere and they were amazing at giving me the heads up about things just coming on so I could see them first - so making sure the chain kept moving.

They also chased up and down the chain to iron out problems.

Without them, I think the whole thing would have collapsed at a couple of points.

So yes - for agreeing the sale itself, it may have been easy enough to bang it on Rightmove, but I appreciated them handling the viewings and vetting those making offers so I was informed about their likelihood to proceed.

I think I've changed my mind about EAs now.

Same here @mrsmalaprop .
The EAs worked really hard both times we were in a chain, both buying and selling.

Solicitors OTOH......

I think what is needed is not cutting out estate agents, as I think you'd be even more prey to chancers and spivs.

Regulate estate agents and have the law changed to be the same as in Scotland, unless someone can do better.

Have you never had a complicated sale / purchase? My EA was worth her weight in gold when I purchased a few years ago, took 6 months and without her it would have fallen through. Selling is only the beginning of a much more complicated journey and if you think that all they do is arrange viewings you are misguided. There are so many complexities and legalities to conveyancing in this country. No way could you do it without an EA unless the Government completely overhauled the system.

In a chain they're with every penny op. We moved in a large chain and I was so grateful for his they managed to hold the chain together. If your simply selling it buying and no chain involved then no not really

Worth every penny I mean

We bought our house privately by putting a note through the door of a house we liked the look of. To be honest it was a painful process because the vendor kept turning up at our house or calling to ask if we wanted various things and by the end I would have happily paid an estate agents fee to have that buffer between us.

We sold two properties directly without the use of an EA, both of those went smoothly so we didn't feel we'd missed out on any vital services. Next property we sold we did use an estate agent and had lots of interest, a few offers and got the sale underway. It was a very long protracted sale process although that wasn't the EA's fault (it was the buyer's and their annoying solicitors) but I don't think they did an awful lot really. When we would ring them to speak to the agent handling our sale, they were either at another office or off on holiday, and nobody was handling their workload while they were away.

I do think that in the case of a troublesome buyer, I would appreciate an agent who was proactive and efficient and good at soothing fractious people. They can be useful and helpful in that respect. I wouldn't want the other party to have my contact details (apart from address when selling obviously) and all necessary communication should be through each other's solicitors.

In earlier sale the EA actually broke something in my unoccupied house while showing a prospective buyer round. I discovered the damage myself while doing a routine welfare check (for the insurance), and phoned the EA to ask what they knew about it. Apparently they were going to tell me but wanted to get someone organised to fix it first. Uh huh. I don't really trust them, and take what they say with a pinch of salt...

We used an online EA’s platform to advertise and sell our house £99.

We supplied the pictures, floor plan and did the viewings and negotiations but we have moved a lot and found despite charging £000’s + vat, we have ended up doing a lot of the work to get a property sold

What they do in itself doesn't warrant what they charge but they regulate themselves and set their own charges so the choice is pay £££ or lose £x worth of your own time. If your time is worth the same or less as an agent charges, do it yourself. Unlike conveyancing there's no skillset to it.

We just bought a property where the seller didn't use an EA. It was a relatively simple sale, although the survey and searches through up a few issues, but the seller dealt with them himself.

He was happy for me to ring him whenever I needed to and was happy to accommodate the surveyor when he was instructed.

It probably helped that the seller was retired, so did not have to deal with us while working, and was half living at the property while the sale went through so was always around anyway. He saved himself a few grand, for the sake of a few phone calls/emails and his solicitor dealt with everything else.

He didn't even have to advertise it himself, as I posted almost in desperation, in a local facebook group after we lost a house in the area we wanted to move to and were on a tight deadline to move out of ours. So we and the seller both lucked out there. But I would definitely consider selling without an EA if we moved again.