Using online estate agents

[JulieAnderton]

Has anyone had any experience of either buying or selling a house via an online estate agent?

DH is keen on going with an online estate agent to save ££, whereas I'm rather more sceptical about how good they'll be at marketing our house.

I would never use one to sell and would be very reluctant to use one to buy either. Very impersonal.

I like many others on here have used an online estate agent and saved ourselves thousands of pounds. I never registered with an estate agent when house hunting either, simply relied on RightMove and Globrix.

If you do a quick search you will see that lots of us have had very positive experiences. I used HouseNetwork 3 years ago to sell my house (have previously used high street estate agents, local ones and national one) and the house I now live in was also sold by HouseNetwork, pure coincidence.

The only time I would use a high street agent would be if I was selling a bungalow, as my Grandad did, mainly because he wasn't internet savvy (although he did have family looking for him on the internet) and older people tend to use high street agents.

I used eMoov. They were fab, did all the pics, got us on right move, handled all the calls - we just had to do the viewings. We sold the house in five days! Couldn't recommend them heartily enough.

Thanks for your feedback. I guess the main thing that worries me about using an online estate agent is that you are dealing with a centralised "call centre" who don't know the specific area in which you are selling. A high street estate agent would probably have a list of potential buyers registered with them looking for properties similar to the one I am selling. It is my perception that potential buyers are unlikely to register their interest in such a way with online agencies.

I would say it very much depends on the area you live in. If you live in a quick sale area then yes, probably give them a try but if you live in an area that is a slow burner then I would consider a high street agent as you need to be in touch with the local market, meet potential buyers in your property shop etc to push the property on.

It also depends on who your target is. We were selling to young professionals/young families and they are all going to have smartphones, internet connections. So we didn't need to be on the estate agents lists or in a shop window.

I have a neighbour who used housenetwork. She said it was great and very cheap (about £900 compared to our local estate agent who charges 2.5k) As others have said though - it really depends on what you're selling. Our road is quite desirable and their home was a good family house.

Hmm, good point about thinking about who we'd be selling to. I'm in a street with 32 identical maisonettes. Of those that have sold recently two have gone to developers, another to a first-time buyer and another to a retiree, so quite a mix. I guess selling using an online agent would get the developers and possibly some first-timers, but not the retiree market.