come and join me if you are trying to sell your house and getting fed up!

[MyDingaling]

Our house has been on the market for just over 3 months. We have had eight viewers, all sounding very positive and giving good feedback to the estate agents but there is no sign of a sale.
We have viewed the house that we would like to buy but obviously we can't do anything until we have an offer made on our house.
I know that this is not the best time of year to put your house on the market and that three months is no a long time but I am getting fed up.

Thanks MyDingaling. They have finally got the property live on Rightmove. Post code is still wrong though, and they have 2 pictures of a 9 by 6 Kitchen..sod it. If it doesn't do anything in a couple of weeks I will give them what for again. Too fed up to do it now.

BytheSea that sounds like a nightmare. My DS starts Secondary School this year, and we need to move for his education by September 2013 because my DH finishes his Army career in 2016 - the year before DS finishes Secondary.

How is everyone getting on?

My husband, who is back in UK on a course at the moment has fallen in love with a house he wants us to buy sigh We have only been on the market 4 days. He really doesn't get the whole house selling and buying lark!

just updating, sold my house about a month ago, well stc anyway. Just getting to that slightly stressful (for me) stage of lots of additional paperwork..........I can't abide paperwork. It must be never used to mind it

must be my age it should have said

We are on the market now 3 weeks
Loads of viewings no offers
I'm fed up trying to keep it clean and tidy with two little kids

Anyone else?

Coming up a year, loads of viewings but no bites. Going to reduce it tomorrow, need to move because it's bad for my health here. We're going to rent after this.

It might be other things putting off potential buyers but at the end of the day it's always price. I.e. the road might be a bit noisy....the decor might not get great...the school might not be 'outstanding'...but if the house is £1 it will sell.

I'm obviously being silly withe £1, but the point is valid - whatever is putting off viewers would still leave them thinking seriously if the price was tempting.

For our area we are the cheapest house on the market! It's so annoying!

Can I join? 10 months on the market here... In that time, the dodgy old kitchen has been replaced with a shiny new one, the price has been dropped repeatedly to sit comfortably at the middle three different valuations we've had, we're below the cost of similar properties listed in the area and have more facilities.

We've had one whole viewing. He booked a second viewing...then never showed up and the EA couldn't get hold of him again. Grr!

Annoyingly, we've found a new build we'd like to buy and they've offered to part exchange our house for the price we're currently listed at. The bank has pre-approved us for a mortgage above what we'd need... But only for houses older than 10 years. For a new build, they want a ludicrous amount in deposit!

At least we have one more year to play with. DD is due to start school in 2 years time and we want to get into our preferred location before we have to start the fun of school postcode lottery.

Sold just before Christmas. Chain fell apart in March (due mainly to our rubbish buyers). Now well and truely back at square one. Having viewings and being made insultingly low offers. I get the point about the price needing to be attractive, but I am not giving it away. If one more person askes 'how much do you want for it' I swear dp will swing for them.....
I am also half packed as we thought we were good to go.

Depends what you mean by 'insultingly low offers' I guess. And whether you're comparing those offers to actual sold prices from the peak of the bubble (2006-2008 for most places) or sold prices before then.

We sold two places in the last year. One fetched 162 (would have been ~200 in 2006/7), the other 208 - several identical neighbours sold for 250-265 in 2007/8 and it still took me a year to get 208.

Ironically for that second one I had an offer of 208 in the first week from viewing number 1, laughed it off and then had a combination of months of no viewings and offers around 190, before I finally got 208 again (diff buyer)!

We moved into rented after that (to avoid a chain and whilst we looked for somewhere to buy) and are now making offers on places, but from the other side of the fence, what we are mainly seeing is insultingly high asking prices :)

House is competatively priced, within the prices that are currently being achieved and is certainly not too high. We know we could have sold for much more in 2007/8 and are very realistic about what we could achieve now. We are more than willing to accept that we are likely to have to take a 5-10% drop on the asking price, but I call 25% below insulting. I think there are some buyers who think a seller will accept anything in this market.

Yes, I think if you're priced well against neighbouring houses, and against sold prices, and cheaper than peak prices then another 25% looks very ambitious!

We're putting 10-15% off offers in against stuff we see as being overpriced, but if something's ludicriously overpriced (i.e. it needs 20%+ taking off) then we just don't bother - there's no point when your expectations are that far apart.

There are however plenty of would-be-sellers who, unlike you, have decided (or believed an agent) that they are going to get an extra 100k/20% over what they paid 3, 4 or 5 years ago for little more than decorating.

Interesting 25% below asking price offer is considered "insulting". IIRC the average asking price of a property is £245k, the average SOLD price of a property if £160k, that is over a 30% difference, so I would not consider 25% below insulting. Once a figure is put into vendors minds by an EA, the majority of vendors believe the money is already in their bank account! This causes so many problems and leads to so many properties stagnating as buyers will not pay inflated prices.

schloss I empathise with the point you are making, but the comparison you give is a bollocks 'apples and oranges' one rolled out on a couple of other forums.

Hypothetically 'the market' is four houses:

House 1 - asking 800 - unsold
House 2 - asking 600 - unsold
House 3 - asking 400 - sells for 350
House 4 - asking 200 - sells for 180

In the above market average asking price (e.g. the Rightmove/Nationwide/Halifax indices) is 500, average selling price (e.g. the land registry index) is 265.

Taking those two figures and equating that to reasonably expecting a discount of circa 50% is naive at best, or disingenuous if not naive!

RC good point....
I think I am getting tired of the unreasonable seller image that is doing the rounds. Yes, there are undoubtedly houses that are overpriced and whose sellers have unreasonable expectations (for whatever reason). However, I think this urban myth has led to a growth in unreasonable buyers who think that every price they see is overinflated. On this forum people constantly say to those trying to sell check the sold prices etc etc. I would argue that equally applies to the buyers. (and I am in both positions). I think my dp sums it 'I want to get as much as possible for it, you want to pay as little as possible for it, the trick is can we meet somewhere that suits us both'.

I too empathise with those trying to sell (and buy) and certainly do not think all vendors are "unreasonable" however the statistics from the land registry for sold prices are lower than the asking prices on average. Of course there are areas where property sells for asking prices but those areas do not form the majority of the country. If someone tried to sell you a £20 note for £25, the majority would not buy it, if it was priced at £20, some would consider it but the majortity would not, price it at £15 and it will sell, is this not the same with property?

I do hope those trying to sell do so quickly as the one thing I am sure no-one will argue about is buying and selling property can be stressful!

Agree its very much an apples and oranges comparison. Another thing thats not often taken into account is that the RightMove asking price survey reflects initial asking prices ie before asking price is reduced.

The only report I'm aware of that looks at price paid as a % of asking is Hometrack (think the average is around 93% at the moment, in other words an average of 7% off asking).

I am selling my DM's house at present. Took the lowest valuation, house in good condition, good enough area, quiet, private parking three beds, courtyard. Not one single viewing in twelve weeks.

I have reduced price down to the same as 2 bedroomed mid terraces without parking and local former council homes (they represent good value). House needs a bit of an update, nothing major at all. My mum had good furniture (not old fashioned) and I have left this in.

I am jealous of your viewings!

If no bites after a month, lower your price - this is prime buying season, it'll taper off after June. Know your market - snatch any offers within 5 -10% of asking and move on!

Myron, believe me I would!!

38 viewings, one broken chain, 2 crappy offers........
But, another decent offer! ahhhhh...crosses fingers, toes and everything else.....looks like we are moving again! (and no chain - cash buyer!)

We've knocked 10k off, which we can I'll afford but we are willing to rent. We have a viewing in the morning. Deposit in place, mortgage in place and previous sale collapsed because vendor pulled out!