House not selling (with listing)

[Houseadvice26]

Posted here for traffic. Thoughts welcome please!

Purchased for £360k in 2023
Heavily renovated
Reduced gradually from £495k last year
Now on with a new EA for £400k

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/165327158#/?channel=RES_BUY

House itself looks alright except the kitchen cabinets which look really out of keeping with the rest? But the front looks abandoned and the bit of garden I spotted through the double doors looks a mess, which would put me off - maybe not the case but it gives a lack of care which would make me suspicious about the quality of the rest of the reno. Get someone to tidy all that up, fix your fence panels and take new photos!

The kitchen looks more like a utility room, plus the green is…not good.

The second pic (of the downstairs) with a bathroom and toilet leading off it looks weird.

Sorry OP I have to wonder whether this is your house or whether you are mocking someone else. I agree with others that house has been butchered. Stripped of any warmth or character. Why is it empty?

The photos are terrible, there is no flow and is that a bathroom without a door? How can a complete “reno” not change the kitchen, there’s even a dent in an appliance. Painting the old kitchen green doesn’t make sense. What family wants gravel, astro turf and paving?

If it is yours, do you have to move? You need to go back to the drawing board and fix what you have broken. What is that huge bare area why is a new kitchen not part of that space?

Never mind the restaging (hard agree) but it's little things like the bed not being made properly that make it all look so cheap. Exposed divan and fitted sheet doesn't even cover the mattress - it's a small thing, but I'd look at that and think this house is all show but done on the cheap.

And FWIW, nothing wrong with doing things on a budget but the cheap looking kitchen and little things like this are not helping

Curb appeal (as per previous images)
Dress the house or don't dress the house. Either strip everything out and sell as blank canvas or do it properly - soft furnishings, plants, colour, rugs, life....

If something can be seen - make sure it's fit for purpose. You've obviously worked hard on it OP, you're just falling at the final hurdle.

It think the room is so narrow they have had to put a sliding door on !

worked hard???? really????

Front of house is ugly as anything! Kitchen is old looking too, doesn’t match the updated rest of house.

I think they likely did work hard on it, that would have taken a lot of time, money and effort, the fact they clearly missed the mark and don’t have an eye for interior design doesn’t change it.

Yes
sliding door shown on plan

lol no!!!

It’s ugly and you’ve made it pretty soulless. It’s hard to sell ugly and soulless. Yes, you may be able to sell to a landlord as a buy to let, but they want cheap as chips, not Instagram. It sounds like you lost touch with the business side of things and got hung up in the social media bit and now you’re gonna lose a lot of money.

Ooo, I disagree about the stairs. The previous ones just scream tripping hazard! The ones op has put in will stop noise and so much heat escaping upstairs. They need a repaint though.

The floor plan is great, the only issue is that you can only get to the lounge via the kitchen. But I don't think you can actually do anything about that without spending a fortune, and your at exit stage now so you aren't going to want to.
The ea needs to make sure the pin on the map is on the right street though, that's shocking that they've dropped the pin on a much worse street.
Look at the other properties on that road, and copy them for the outside. Your target market is definitely not a landlord or a hmo. You'd never get a hmo license in that location.
I've bought, renovated and sold a number of houses now. I'm afraid your changes to the garden have devalued the property at the moment, you'll struggle to sell until you rectify it. It'll cost/be hard work, but you've produced an almost move in ready house (accepting matters of taste differ) and the garden would be an asset if you lawn it and add some planting. You were given terrible advice there I'm afraid. As it stands no one will think 'great, a blank canvas' re the garden, they'll just be thinking how much money and hassle it'll be to sort it out, and they are likely looking at your property because they don't want to do any work, so the garden does not fit the story.
The bathrooms are great. Flooring is great, hall is great.
Kitchen is letting you down a bit. Bathrooms and kitchen are the most important rooms. I like the color, but it looks cheap overall. If you don't want to fit a new one, change the handles and worktop, and take a much better picture.
I always insist on a proper photographer, the difference is worth the cost.
Dress the house, it needs furniture and soft furnishings. It needs more colour to alleviate the grey. Grey is just too builder basic, it's not aspirational, and you really need to sell a story if you want to make a profit. Each room needs to show how you'd live in it. Get pretty, massive throws for the beds that you can just chuck over for the photos and for viewings, then you don't have to worry about ironed (and well fitting) sheets. Get some stuff, make it look like you live there.
Once you've weeded the front garden, add pots full of flowers. I'm afraid I agree with others that you should dig up the semi circle of tarmac and replant, but if you don't want to, cover it. I'm thinking a few strategically placed pots of different sizes, surrounded by pebbles, something like that.
Good luck.

Yes I think they have probably worked hard.

If you look at the older listing, they have redone every room, put in new bathrooms and kitchen and so on.

Worked Hard does not equate to 'done a good job'. I have said upthread that it's naff, poorly presented and in need of dressing and curb appeal. But that doesn't mean that they didn't work hard.

Nothing has been done to it that would boost its value by £100k in 2.5 years.

It’s the front garden 💯. Get rid of the weeds and at least get some pots. The front makes it look abandoned. Get new photos once it’s done

Op did you rip the whole garden out completely and just leave it bare?

No curb appeal- sorry OP but it’s really ugly from the outside.

It looks soulless and dull from the outside. Inside is weird. Is this a reno? You’ve made odd choices for kitchen and bathroom.

You’ve really ruined the look of it from the outside, sorry.

Ultra-modern would really put me off, as it's not easy to put your own stamp on (unless completely ripping it all out, which would seem stupid if it's all new!). I genuinely don't think this 'grey' look is in style anymore - it's more quirky and colourful, or lighter colours.

It's a family house - but the area is likely retirement, and the decor is 'city flat'?

Some nice features (wooden/laminate floor, iron radiators and log burner) but they clash with the grey walls, staircase and carpets.

The kitchen really sticks out as not being done, and would be expensive to do (adding to the list price).

The bathrooms - everything clashes? So much going on here.

The photos are awful. They look warped and make the interior look small and dingy.

Better photos, repaint the walls. New carpets if you can afford it and possibly try to dress the space a bit?

Colourful prints on the walls, some colourful accessories in the bathrooms might make them more trendy, and some plant pots etc.outside wouldn't go amiss!

Looking at rhe comparison images it basically had a wrap around garden, I think they’ve ripped out all of it all the way round and it’s just tarpaulin out the back

The "old kitchen painted green" would put me off as it shows an inconsistent/surface level approach to improvements (i.e. putting in a new grey carpet rather than doing major work to increase the value). I appreciate that that sounds annoying if you've forked out for a new bathroom etc but rightly or wrongly that's what i think a lot of prospective buyers would feel.

🤣

I think lesson learned here op

all that house needed was new kitchen, bathroom enhancements, redo flooring and a lick of paint, and it would have sold. But you also bought quite close to ceiling price,

ripping the whole garden out front and back, leaving it with tarpaulins and weeds, paining the kitchen an odd green and then making everything grey was a costly mistake.

i do hope yoh sell quickly and just dust yourself down.

Just found the old listing, can see that you've probably extended the size of the guest loo and lost the door to the lounge from the hall? It's messed up the flow a bit unfortunately.

They’ve painted the old kitchen and haven’t changed any appliances

and ripped up both gardens creating a weed filled mess - I agree hard work doesn’t equal quality