To want to share my shock at this?

[GardenPart]

6 months ago - me and my siblings sold our childhood home for £500,000.

My parents bought the house when they got married in the 60s.

Both parents dead now, so estate sorted out between us.

We sold the house to an experienced developer.

My siblings and I have moved out of our home town but my daughter has moved into a flat about a mile away from our childhood home. Anyway - 2 days ago my daughter was visiting me and out of curiosity scrolling through her phone at local property sites and suddenly called me over -

anyway - to my surprise my childhood home was on the ‘for sale’ section - I was so shocked my initial thought was that it was the house next door to my parents that was for sale which looked identical from the outside. I honestly thought the developer could not possibly have done the property up so quickly ! But no, it was our old property.

‘I’m surprised about 2 things basically :

1. The speed it took them to develop and modernise many - or even most aspects of the property - it was actually on the market last month so that meant it took them 5 months. Don’t get me wrong - I know we sold it to an experienced developer - who wouldn’t waste any time and would be very efficient with the progress of the property - but even so !! 5 months? I thought it would take them at least a year.

1. The price. We sold it for £500000 6 months ago - it’s now on the market for £800000 - a 60.% mark up! If it was resold I expected the selling price to be circa £650k and only around £700k at the very most.

if it sells for the £800k asking price that’ll be the second most expensive sale ever in the street - this is surprising as it’s a semi detached house and the most expensive went for £820k 8 years ago - but detached.

The pics of the house look absolutely lovely - they’ve modernised it to a great standard - bathrooms, toilet, kitchen looks gorgeous and my goodness it needed loads of attention - my mum let the house go to seed after my Dad died - it was too big for her living there alone - it was a lot for a young adult in prime health to manage alone let alone an 89 year old !! They’ve also kept some of the lovely original features. It’s so nice to see our old childhood home so loved and modernised and less tired looking so I tip my hat to the developer and really glad we sold to him - but -

AIBU to be surprised by the speed of the turn around and the amount of the price elevation on the property? Or is this normal ?

That’s about right! And you agreed the sale ..end of.

My mum cluelessly sold her house for £20,000 (no that’s not a typo). The developers had it back on the market within 5 months for £80,000

When a house is empty it’s so much easier.

Never watched Homes Under The Hammer then?!

I'm not surprised.
They have a team of people ready. Know what works.
Re the price, they don't need to second guess. Put it in for the max they can hope to get. They can easily reduce it because they know their costs to the penny.
If they can't get their price, they can let it for a few years.
It's great that your home has been done up so nicely and hopefully will have a young family who will love it too.

I am surprised at the amount of people that think this a huge amount of money made! He has not made 300k in 5 months. He paid stamp duty upon purchasing the property, he has renovated the property which from OP description would easily have cost 150k (if not more, neither trades nor materials are cheap these days), he has put it back on the market and so will have agent and solicitor fees (he may have some favours here but ultimately there will be costs), if he is the seasoned professional OP claims him to be then this will not be his only source of income meaning that any profit after all of the mentioned is likely to subject to at least 40% tax, then he had at least 3-6 months before the sale actually goes through (if he’s lucky), meaning he’s lucky if he’s made 60K profit in 12 months? Which don’t get me wrong OP is not to be sniffed at but it is not 300K nor is it high reward for what’s probably been quite hard work!

This is probably going to sound very sentimental, even maudlin. I downsized a couple of years ago, and found an extremely sympathetic and helpful real estate agent to handle the sale. He organised a builder to do basic repairs (new flooring, painting, new water tank) at a very reasonable price. I moved out before any repairs were done and didn't want to revisit it as I had lovely memories of living there, and had absolutely loved everything about the house and especially the area, and didn't want to feel regret for my decision.

When I looked at the listing I was delighted. The house sparkled and I almost felt like a happy parent who had set their child on the path to success and a happy future (said I sounded sentimental). It sold very quickly to a lovely person who appreciated it.

I am not in the UK.

Yes amazing how quickly they can turn things around unless they are being paid by an insurance company or returning to solve a previous issue then they are so slow!!

The real value vs the nominal value can be quite a shock as most people take the nominal value as a 'profit'. Once inflation has been calculated over the years of the ownership of the home, it can be quite an eye opener. So on paper, I have made approx £300k in 15 years on my home. In 'real terms' once calculated, it's more like -£41,000 due to inflation.

From ChatGpt

"The nominal price is the actual selling price at that moment, the real price considers the impact of inflation to reflect the true value in terms of purchasing power.

This distinction is important when assessing whether you’ve truly made a profit after accounting for changes in the cost of living"

That's kind of the purpose selling to a property developer OP.

A developer bought my mum’s house . When it went up for sale I asked the estate agent if I could have a look . He let me have the keys for half an hour . I grabbed my auntie and we went round . The old fashioned house had been transformed. We always knew it had potential but we had neither the money nor the skills to do the work . It was also cathartic as it no longer seemed like my old home . A future buyer built a huge conservatory on the house . I was curious how they had managed it as the garden was very sloping . When next door went up for sale we were clearly able to see from their photos how it had been done .

@GardenPart can you share the link to it? I’m dying see it

When my Husbands Father passed away we bought his house, paying his siblings their share. We renovated it to update & modernise it. It took the Team 7 months from start to finish & looked amazing when they'd finished. We had it valued not long after & the mark up price was decent. We've no intention of moving but it's nice to know if we ever decided to we have money in the house or when we're gone there's enough money for our kids to have a comfortable amount left to them.