Open Days

[Spirael]

The latest tactic in my quest to find someone to buy my house! Open days, does anyone have any experience of them? Do they work? What do I need to do??

• House has already been decluttered to within an inch of its life, but I will strive to declutter even further! Family photos down, even the cupboards empty, etc.

• It will, of course, be spotlessly clean.

• I was going to bake some chocolate brownies in the morning... Firstly so the house smells nice, secondly as bribary to viewers and thirdly as comfort food if no-one shows up...

• DH and DD will be shipped out for the event, and the cats will be locked out and any evidence of any of them disappeared!

• I have some experience at design and publishing, I was debating making a flyer/leaflet/brochure to hand out on the day. Containing things the EA seem to be reluctant to share - like a map centred on the house of all the fabulous things within walking distance (the location is pretty good), details such as the kitchen being new for 2012 and the gas/electrics being done at the same time, council tax band (we're low), lack of water meter, etc. Worthwhile, or not?

• Notice outside the house? Balloons?? Dancing monkeys???

Anything else do I need to consider?

In addition... At present we have a small amount of leeway remaining in our already reduced and sensible (by sold prices) asking price, under the assumption we're going to get offers under asking.

The EA want me to drop the price by a small amount (about 2%) now, and then advertise on the Open Day a special price which is basically our limit - going back to the 2%-under-current-price afterwards.

Do people think that's a tactic that would work? Or is it a waste of time?

We moved recently, were looking for a house for 18m so saw loads. Some were open days. IMO Now they are not a great idea. Smacked of desperation to me and seemed to be used mainly by the more "cowboy" estate agents just desperate for a sale at any price ( yes you cubit and west ). Also didn't put me in a buying frame of mind as you are "one of the crowd" and hard to look around if other people there. I think potential buyers like to feel a bit special when they look round. House we eventually bought was not via an open day. The ones we saw that had open days were usually ( not always ) the ones that were difficult to sell.

just say when was fitted not "is newly refurbished for 2012" just say" kitchen was fitted in monthegmarch 2012 "

The high power electric shower in the bathroom "was fitted in march 2012."

Well, it was all a huge waste of time... No-one showed up. :( Doesn't look like we're ever going to be moving!

Oh poo! Sorry it didn't work out. Fingers crossed your buyer is not too far away!

That's a shame. I will not be holding an open day, as I am sure people won't turn up. I just hope there's someone out there for you (and me too)!!

I'm sorry about that, Very disappointing.

Keep your leaflet though for any future viewers, as I think that will really help sell your house.

Sorry to hear that OP. Just my own bias but as a buyer I am really put off by open days You can't get a feel for a place if you're all having to shuffle round each other in hallways and spend twenty seconds in each room by yourselves. And inevitably the noisiest person there monopolises the agent/owner so everybody else has a bit of a wasted viewing. I never go to them, if the house is still on afterwards I'll ask for a separate appointment. So maybe see what turns up this week! Fingers crossed for you, leaflet idea is great, I will steal that if I ever manage to buy a house to sell.

OP I would seriously take that up with your EA. If they suggest an Open Day, they have to do a serious amount of work to get new people (so not people they've already told about the house) to come along and see it. I would seriously question why they suggested an open day, how many people they had contacted and how many of them they expected to turn up. They also have to do some serious leg work for these to pay off. If they were expecting people to turn up, then they need to get on phones and find out why they didn't come along.

Sorry, there were a few too many "seriously"s in that post weren't there..

EA's are desperate. Those that haven't moved into lettings are going out of business, so it's not necessarily that they think an Open Day will work, more a random throw of the die in desperation to get a sale and a bit of revenue.

I originally suggested it to the EA as an idea FireOverBabylon, asking whether it was feasible, whether it would generate any interest and what I needed to do in order to go ahead with it if the answer to the first two questions was yes. Next thing I know, I have a message on my answer machine telling me that the Open Day will be held a week on Saturday. So I just took it from there, really...

Not really sure what to do now. :( We're in an area of 1930's red brick semi's in similar states of decor/repair. We're the cheapest one listed with both a garage and a conservatory, as well as a porch. We're inside but towards the top end of average sold prices for similar properties in the area (£115k-£125k) but we're not expecting to get asking price and offers would take us to below average, I would think.

We're starting to wonder whether there's just no-one out there seriously looking in our area! I don't think anyone that's visited our house has actually been ready to proceed. If that's the case, there's not much point dropping the price further, is there?

If we did drop it again, we'd basically have to hold out for asking price as our house will have lost so much money since we bought 7 years ago that our savings just won't cover the difference anymore and we won't have the deposit available to take the next step up - negating the point of moving!

[bangs head against wall]

We've come to the same conclusion. There's nothing wrong with our house - there's just nobody out there!! We are going to sit it out now and live in hope. It's really tough though as it's all I think about every day and all we talk about each evening.

It's also the case that if the price were wrong, it can't be too wrong given the comparible asking/selling prices listed online. A similar house on our street actually sold for £17k more than what we're asking earlier in the year! But we're not even getting silly offers of £100k or such.

I think our current plan is to try and sit on our hands for another few weeks now and hope that either the arrival of summer or the Funding for Lending scheme that starts on the 1st August motivates some new buyers.

If there's still nothing, I guess we'll decide then whether to risk dropping the price again or just wait out our locked in period with the EA then give up and come off the market at the end of summer.

At least if we do come off the market, we can have some of our possessions back. We've decluttered so much that it's impossible to really live in the house anymore! It feels like we've been staying in a hotel or such for the last year, with only our immediately necessary possessions, unable to really relax or spread out.

It's also annoying, as we've seen what could be our perfect forever house, within our means if we can just sell our current house for within £5k of asking! I worry every day that I'll log in to find the dream house displaying as Sold STC before we get a chance to offer. :(

I am a slave to Rightmove and check it hourly to see if the houses we like are sold. Am beginning to hate the phrase "what will be, will be"!

There is a small flicker of hope... A couple viewed the house yesterday with the EA and apparently are very interested in having a second viewing! Unfortunately, only once they've sold their own house. :(

But they are getting viewings on their house, so hopefully will get an interested party soon! So now I have to hope someone else sells. [crosses everything]

Apparently they mentioned they noticed the advertisements for the Open Day, but for whatever reason didn't attend. So it could be as MadBusLady described!

Fingers crossed for you :)