No Offers On House After 3 Weeks - Normal?

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My house went on the market 3 weeks ago. We've had 11 viewings and no offers as yet.

I'm interested in whether this is normal, in terms of the number of viewings we've had and if we should have received an offer by now?

AIBU to expect some results by now or is it just way to early?

Thanks. For context, it's a 3-bed semi detatched house in Southampton, valued at around £300,000 by the estate agents.

Its a slow market at the mo. My eldest daughter is trying to sell her house AND her fathers house. They have been on 3 weeks too and only had 3 viewings between them! No offers. Reduced both on Saturday. One viewing on Wednesday that's all.

It's a slow market at the moment, so I'd say 11 viewings in 3 weeks is pretty good. No offers from 11 viewings suggests the price may be too high? Are you in a hurry to sell?

11 viewings is a lot. You need to get feedback from the estate agent

There’s very little movement on the market at the moment.

i’m on the watch because potentially looking to downsize if the right house in the right area comes up and there was so much on the market last autumn and winter and very little now.

What was the feedback from the viewings?

Thank you, our house does need a bit of modernisation so I wondered if it's been overvalued, but it was valued at £290,000 four years ago for our mortgage so £300,000 didn't sound overpriced. We're not in a major rush, although we are seeing houses we like come on the market and go which is frustrating. Trying to prioritize selling our house before seriously looking at other houses but it's easier said than done!

The crucial information here is whether those viewers were in a position to proceed? You must ask your agent to check this.

We eventually sold last year after 4 months. Everyone agreed it was a great house but only one viewer had actually sold their own house and they bought ours.

Hang on.

Most are just saying they liked the house but it just wasn't for them. Some are saying the house needs more work than anticipated, but aren't making offers in light of that.

Thank you. Yes most of the viewers are either first-time buyers or have sold their properties. We've had one or two viewers whose houses are still on the market, but these are in the minority.

My gut's telling me we just need to give it a bit more time but it's hard to know without much knowledge of the market so it's useful to hear other people's experiences :)

It sounds like it doesn't look as good in real life as in the pics. Is there anything you can do about that. With that number of viewings I would have expected at least one offer. In your position I would hang on at the current price until after the end of the summer hols but reduce at that point if not sold.

Do the listing photos reflect the condition of the house accurately? Does the text indicate that it requires some modernising? Agents will use all kinds of trickery to make a property look at its best, but that’s no good if viewers are getting through the door and finding something completely different to what they were anticipating. Eleven viewings is decent, indicating that it’s less likely to be the price than if you’d just had no interest at all, so it’s more likely to be a disconnect between the listing and the house itself.

If viewers arrive expecting a bit of a doer-upper, they’re more likely to make an offer after assessing in person because their expectations have been managed. If they arrive without that expectation, and weren’t interested in having to do much work, they’re much more likely to simply scratch it off the shortlist.

3 weeks is really not very long. 11 viewings is quite good. Any second viewings? As others said the market is slow at the moment (uncertainty about the economy being one reason). July / August is also a very slow time. Will likely pick up around Sept.

I think the images accurately show the house - the main modernisation needed is things woodchip wallpaper (which are painted white and aren't offensive). Our kitchen is on the small side, but I feel that's reflected in the pictures.

I recently sold a very similarly priced house that also had some work needed doing to it. It is definitely more niche because first time buyers don’t seem to want to do a lot to a house if they’re stretching themselves with the mortgage already.

I would say see if you get any second viewings at least in the next couple of weeks and if not, it’s always the price.

We are in the process of selling and had 2 offers on the 4th week, 5% below asking price. Everyone here says that it's a slow market, but we are in Essex and properties are flying off the shelf.
Our first offer pulled out within days (changes their mind) and we lost an onward purchase because it went back to market and re sold the same day.

I’m my experience buyers will do modernisation work to older characters properties with original features. They are much less agreeable to doing work to a more modern house for some reason.
houses where I live go very quickly usually (couple of days to a week) there are some that hang around and usually get reduced and then get snapped up.

If you drop into the under £300k bracket your house will come up in more searches when buyers search on right move etc.

have you done all the obligatory de-cluttering and sprucing up that buyers expect?

Thank you, this is helpful.

We're considering dropping to offers above £295,000 if we don't get any offers soon. We've decluttered and are carrying out a bit of painting to clean things up a little, but don't want to get into the realms of redoing the kitchen, for example, if buyers would want to change it anyway.

Because in older properties you are at worst going back to brick and floorboard or stone/ tile. In modern properties with stud walls, at worst you have no walls at all and you’re going back to some dodgy assemblage of plywood sheet on rafters or concrete. Newer are also built awfully.

If people are saying work is needed, then yes youve overpriced and its putting people off.

I would drop to £290-295K and then aim to expect offers around or slightly below that tbh. If nobody is offering when it’s listed at £300K, they aren’t going to suddenly decide to offer £300K when it’s listed “above £295K”, and many people find the “offers over” approach offputting and avoid viewing at all.

It's a 1930s property, no stud walls.

It's frustrating, as it was valued at £290,000 four years ago for our mortgage so when the estate agents valued it at offers over £300,000 we didn't think this was outlandish.

Ours was in the market for near 6 months if I remember correctly.

This. My estate agent kept telling me they had people to view but like one needed a place for their camper van plane caravan on their drive and asked the agent to show them only houses that met this brief but they still showed them mine. Total nonsense.
So ask for feedback look if it is priced properly - look at local prices for same or better houses - look at sold prices.

It's Southampton... not South Kensington. No one is owed house price increases year on year.