House won't sell - desperate

[louby44]

Hello, so after a relationship split in Dec desperate to sell the house. I have all the equity and am giving him £5k as a good will gesture as he has contributed to the mortgage etc over the 5 years we've lived here, once debts etc are paid off there will nothing left. We won't have made anything on it and the £5k is coming out of my lump of equity.

House in north staffs, new 5 years ago. On a good estate in a lovely area. 5 beds, 3 bathrooms, 3 storey, modern, very large garden/decked area, south facing garden, modern, well decorated and presented.

Have dropped the price to what we paid for it. Exp wanted it on at £25k more when it first went up for sale in January. So price is realistic.

I've had 4 interested parties, 1 of which viewed twice and another who made an offer under the stamp duty threshold.

I just can't understand it. I have little money and need to move on and buy my own place. It's on Right Move and I've had an open house, estate agents are good, I've agreed to rent if someone wants to move fast.

Help!!

Yes at least negative equity isn't a factor.

But an offer of £250k leaves me with £50K, an offer of £280K leaves me with £80k.....but if I don't sell I have £0k!!

Maybe offering to pay the stamp duty is the way forward! My parents would lend it to me.

Buyers will not offer and pay a price that you need/ prefer. They will pay what the property is worth and right now you are being very unrealistic :(

get it off the websites soon if the immediate measures don't work. Then put it back on with fresh photos and a realistic price. Don't cut the price on the same listing, anyone with propertybee can see that you've done that.

it is still possible for people to see that you have tried to sell before, but a little harder.

oh, and get your agents to learn some basic writing skills. Terrible blurb!

I think the advantage of paying the stamp duty is that people will stretch and extra £20k and offer £270, whereas they wouldn't stretch to £278, even with £270k you would end up receiving £263 after paying the stamp duty.

Somehow it just works.

Not sure if offering to pay 50% of the stamp duty would work?

Do any of the local agents do floor plans, I like floor plans...

I would also negotiate hard on the estate agent fees - worth a try at leasst???

I'd seriously repaint the bright rooms - get everything neutral. The line-green walls, blue walls and purple walls are off-putting.

Paint it white or cream. Get it on with a different agent. Cheaper than knocking £30k off.

I can't believe there are 5-bed houses going for £250k. We're in berkshire struggling to get 3 beds for that. :-(

Ask your estate agent to market this as a 4 bedroom house + extra bed as study on RightMove/Zoopla etc. Most people only really want a 4 bedroom house and will search for just that. Leaving you 5 bedroom folk out in the cold..

Repaint the bright rooms.

When you get the pictures redone, make sure there's one of the views over Keele. Also, sunny day etc, no Christmas decs. Dress shower room well, eg nice liquid soap on sink, full toilet roll (hide those two on top of cistern) new fluffy towel somewhere. If I was going to paint one room it would be the blue one to a neutral colour. Move the twigs and large vase in bathroom picture, they dominate. Again fat toilet roll and fluffy towels. The office on landing is a good idea, it just needs to be a bit less cluttered, maybe centralise desk and get rid of book shelf. Oh and move the lamp in the lounge, it needs to be in a corner.

For other ideas, have a look at a local new build show house.

Other than that, I think it's a nice house. I don't know the area but I'm guessing from the comments on here that it's down to price.

We would be looking at houses like this if moving. For me, the short bath would be a no, having had one before and the cluttered landing makes me feel like you have no space for the PC and desk area. Can you replace it with an armchair?
I like the bathroom.

Louby, I think you need photos of the dining room and utility too. It's a big house but the kitchen photo looks cramped to me. If you have 4 kids you want somewhere to eat with them, and a utility means you can 'hide' the washing.

When we were looking I was put off by small kitchens unless there was a sep dining room and we've only got one child. I know that it's in the blurb, but a lot of people (me included) only skim the photos before dismissing.

Is there a good school in the catchment? If so get that added to the blurb too.

It looks like a lovely house but I think its overpriced. If you look on rightmove for completed sales within quarter of a mile of your postcode, there is nothing (not one single property) that sold in the last year for more than 225k, other than 1 new build which went for 249,995. I appreciate that your house might be bigger / on a better plot but it suggests that people looking to spend 270/280k might be looking elsewhere, or perhaps people don't / can't go to the level you're looking for. As others have said, when you bought it as a new property, it came with a premium. A new house devalues immediately upon purchase simply because its not a new house anymore. IN a rising market, that wouldn't necessarily have mattered, the value would have increased due to market conditions but thats not been the case for the last 4 or 5 years.

Agree it is over priced, I live 6 miles from you and in my estate a five bed detached went for £180,000, although where you live is much nicer :-)

Good luck in selling.

Get them to take more up to date photos

Christmas tree shouts out that it has been hanging around for months thats why folk are offering low prices...

I think that if you remove a property for sale for either 3 or 6 weeks, then when it is readvertised it will appear as a completely new listing on Zoopla etc. might be worth thinking about too. What Lizzie says is right, people will offer low if has been on the market for months.

Just change estate agents, the photos and blurb are awful! I think that actually it looks lovely, but I agree that the desk on the landing is a bit cramped looking. I'd also want more photos - so utility, every bedroom, dining room and the en suite. And definitely one with a sunny garden and a sunny front of house. I don't think you need to bland it out especially, but I have seen MUCH better photos.

Our neighbours advertised their house at OIEO a particular price with not great photos and got no interest at all before christmas. Took it off after three months then put it back on again a couple of months later with lovely photos and an actual asking price, and it sold in a week. Their big change was actually turning their box room into a nursery, which made it look like a proper four bed, rather than a three bed with a junk room.