Selling Experts - Help I need inspiration...

[MyAngels]

Hi all

Our 4 bed house has been on the market for 10 weeks - 24 viewings (only 1 in the last 3 weeks though), not a sniff of an offer, one second viewing. Our town has a large new estate (they are still building it) so there's a lot of competition around our price range with brand new houses. Our house is 16 years old and on estate on the other edge of town, pretty far from the centre, but close to the best infants school (and good juniors) in town.

We are in the process of buying a cottage across town, nearly at exchange (fingers crossed) and have large mortgage sorted for that so don' t need to sell ours first (although owning 2 big houses will be very expensive), so would prefer to sell asap.

Am after ideas to stimulate interest in our house. Yes, it could do with a new kitchen and flooring througout, but would be willing to take that into consideration in the price, if we ever got anyone to get that far. Its on for £279,995 - are we scuppered by the stamp duty thing? We have offered to pay the difference and have told the EA we will consider a house swap with a smaller 2 bed which we could rent out as an investment.

We're stuck for any other ideas....any inspiration anyone?

Thanks

You've had a lot of viewings which means there must be interest in houses of this size in this area. Drop the price. If you've had 24 viewings but no offers then it's overpriced. It will sell if the price is right. Sorry.

24 viewings shows that it must be reasonably nice - I think stamp duty will play a part but you've addressed that. It's the wrong time of year for people wanting to move for schools so that might be a factor. If you're feeling brave, you could link .

Seems surprising that you've had 24 viewings and not a single offer, not even a low one. What are the comments from the viewers? Is it too much work? It sounds a bit harsh but if people are not even making offers, it sounds like something is putting them off?? Is there a fundamendal compromise (tiny garden / difficult access)?

It depends where it is re schools. Around here (south west london/ surrey borders), you could get some interest from people with primary age children as applications (for primary) close in January 2012 for entry in Sept 2012. But it could well be different in your area.

Thanks all.

The feedback we have had doesn't seem to follow much of a pattern

• too much work required (kitchen is the original 1995 one, rather old fashioned by today's taste, but not awful. Bathroom suite is beige, not white, but tiling has been redone in a modern way recently)
• not enough work to do (from someone who wanted a fixer-upper)
• too big (for single woman)
• too small (for family with 3 growing boys - I agree)
• too far away from town
• area too quiet
• bedroom 3 has a slopey roof (ie like an attic roof, not a structural defect) - ?

We are competing with more newly built houses on the new estate with more modern fittings (but that estate is on floodplain (funny how no-one finds this out till the searches). We are on top of a hill, so not so easy walking distance from the high street, but better when it rains come (or the ice caps melt!).

I hadn't thought about school application time (the infants was oversubscribed this year and many from further away in the town got caught out). January is the cut off date here.

Funnily enough we had a viewer who really loved it yesterday, but as they were in the house they got a call to say their buyer had pulled out, so no joy for us....

Maybe we just have to wait for the right person - I accept we may need to drop the price, but would rather someone offered a pittance first - at least it would be a start...

It sounds to me like your agent is not doing their job properly and is sending people round who aren't suited - things like location, size, etc, should be obvious before viewing. Sometimes agents just try to get footfall through the door to make it look as if they're actually doing their job.

Is your property on rightmove/ findaproperty? Is there a floorplan viewable online or as part of the property particulars (online far preferable). Does it say about you being in this year's school catchment area on the particulars? It should. If you're on a hill, are there views? Do the particulars show these?

I would also tactfully mention to viewers about the floodplain issue - it's really, really important and would completely put me off your competing nearby houses. That's presuming you're around for viewings. If not, ask your agent to point this out too - although of course if they're also marketing the estate houses they won't want to do so.

I agree that the agent may well have been playing the numbers game with the viewings - more the merrier and all that...

Would love to be more upfront about the floodplain issue (the agents do the viewings) - it isn't really a river issue, more a below sea level thing (we're in Somerset - so much is reclaimed land) - the Environment Agency flood risk map would be a revelation to many around here. All we'd need is a lot of rain around a good high tide and I reckon our viewings would pick up again!!! Hey ho...