How soon did you start to get viewings?

[Sooperswooper]

Our house went on the market early last week (right move, local paper, in the EA window etc) having had 4 valuations of exactly the same, plus assurances that our house would be snapped up within days due to demand in the area etc etc (i did take all of this with a big pinch of salt!). However, zero interest whatsoever. Not even a phone call or enquiry to the EA. People though probably just my friends and family have been looking on right move but it seems to go no further.

Very similar houses have sold recently in the area for the asking price so there is demand - unless of course the demand has now been satisfied! The EA we went with said that they had a big list of potential people that would be interested, but that hasn't materialised.

I realise that it's only been on for a week, but still, i would have expected a little nip of interest? Happy to be told that my expectations are far too high and I need to relax about it

Whereabouts in the country are you? I think that makes a lot of difference. We had viewings the day we went on the market and the next day, then accepted an offer, but its a sellers market round here. The first house we wanted to buy sold as we were viewing it (all the parts of Essex that are easily commutable to London).

We're in Surrey and the market does seem to be pretty buoyant but I think unfortunately where I am falls out of 3 bigger town 10 mile markers on RM so many people might think it's just that little bit too far out. One of the reasons we chose our EAs though was because they have offices in these towns, so I was hoping that network would be utilised in some way. I think it's also because I know that similar properties here have been under offer within a week and houses are generally selling. Or were

I still might have unrealistic expectations though, especially as we're moving back to Oxford, & the houses there seem to sell within seconds of going on the market. Still, I would have hoped for at least one enquiry!!!

I would have thought in a buoyant market you should have had at least one enquiry by now unless the price or something about the property is putting people off.

Are the photos good?

Is there a floor plan?

Our house sold the day it was listed and it wasn't even a very popular area.

We are in London and we chose the EA with the lowest valuation, the first weekend it has 10+ viewings, but it takes a few more weeks to get good offers. There was a similar property nearby with 20% more asking price and it was on the market for 5 months and it reduced the asking price 3 times before it attracts genuine buyer viewings and sold

Photos are great, floor plan is there, lovely description..

I think what it might be (so any suggestions as to mitigate for this) is that we bought it just under two years ago and so we paid the market value for it then. We have done a lot with / to the house since we moved in to make it a beautiful family home. Obviously anyone can now see the price paid but there are still some photos from when it was previously marketed on RM (i have asked RM to take these down). However, I remember that these photos were not in any way reflective of the house when we bought it (as it had had numerous tenants / paint shades/DIY disasters/no garden I think) so they were years old when the house did look passable. Aargh, this makes absolute sense now in terms of why people might not be interested.

What to do?!

If the price is reflective of the market today- what you paid 2 years ago wouldn't put people off viewing IMO.

it might make them offer under the asking price if they were interested but they'd at least want to see what they'd get for their money.

it sounds like it might be over priced- how does it compare with other properties at that price?

That's what dh said, bear. I really don't think it's overpriced based on what is around but again, if it's not getting any interest, maybe it is. All four EAs said between 400 - 420 so we went with a guide price of 400. There are also a few similar properties on the market (for example, with a bigger garden but more out of the centre) but priced at 410 / 415.

Recently sold are very similar properties but with one less bedroom and they were on for 395k and went for pretty much the asking price.

Just a bit crestfallen that there hasn't even been an enquiry!

Are rightmove showing the old photos under your listing?

It might just be no one is looking ago.

How much did you pay for it?

• ago - atm

I honestly think most houses now are sold on the advertising seen on Rightmove. That said when we sold last year the EA had got viewers lined up before it hit Rightmove - I had 4 booked in before it went live. When it did go in RM I had another 10 want to view. Maybe it's the time of year? People looking towards holidays etc. Sounds though from what you've said you've just been a bit unlucky with no buyers looking at this moment. Wait it out at least a few weeks then re-evaluate I would say.

Dont expect to get back what you've spent in the last 2 years.

If you get what you paid you are doing well.

It is a different market compared to last summer, though EAs want to make it looks like last summer

I'm always a little bit put off by "guide price". What did your EA say was the advantage of saying guide price over, say, a figure of £399,950. Perhaps buyers think you're looking for much more than £400k.

I also think you need a very honest friend (or if you're very brave, MNetters) to critique your house / location so you can be sure you're comparing like with like when you say 'very similar comparable have sold for ....'. You might love something or have grown used to something so don't think of it as a disadvantage (e.g. being overlooked or busy road or not within a particular schools catchment) which might be off - putting to purchasers.

I'd say there is something that is putting people off if you've not even had an enquiry in a buoyant market. Even if it were price, people would still want to view and perhaps make a low offer.

Thanks everyone- this is really helpful. We did discuss the guide price thing but just went with what the EA said so perhaps it's worth reconsidering that in a few weeks if we're still in the same position as we'd be more than happy to put that for the asking price and see where we got to. I think one of the problems with doing that now though, is that it shows up as reduced on RM, and not sure how that would look to a prospective purchaser so soon after going on.

I did exactly that last night at a get together re: critique, because I do love the house & as a result was aware that I might be blind to the disadvantages. They tallied with what we are already aware of, though it was mentioned that it might be worth decluttering a bit. We're not talking extreme hoarders, or even any hoarder type clutter, but we've got lots and lots of books (not just lying around -in bookcases!) so it might be worth looking at that. However i think that's something for when we actually have viewings as at the moment it doesn't negatively impact the photos (i don't think- can certainly post a couple of the pics up here so you get a feel for it).

Yes, RM are- you can click on the property history so they show up. Hoping that they might come off though.

Our house went up in November last r year and we haven't had a single viewing to date.
Now renting it out.

Wow, Roseybee. Can I ask where abouts in the country you are? Did you end up reducing the price? I think that's a route we might end up having to take as a last resort, but fingers crossed things might pick up a little bit and we might start to get a little bit of interest.

I would put it up at a price rather then a guide price. We are buying now and we put our limit in the search on rm knowing that's the max we can go to so our max is £275k if we see some where which says guide price 275k we assume they want more then that and wouldn't even bother looking at it.

We're in Scotland. Our issue is that the help to buy scheme has screwed us. People can now skip the flat and do the house. The market is flooded with flats like ours with peoe undercutting us. We've dropped the price but we can't afford to drop it any further really as our mortgage is still too high (our property dropped in value by almost 20k in 7 years due to the recession argh).
Xx

It is funny how different people perceive the same things- I think totally the opposite on guide prices.

If it says £400k to £420k I think- great they're willing to start at £400k and that's before survey results etc so I'd never write off a property that was in the right ballpark.

If I saw a guide price of £400 - £420k I would assume that it'd be pointless to offer £390-395k, so if that were my top budget, I wouldn't bother to view it.

The estate agent implied that there were buyers waiting. Now that they have your business, I would be asking how many of these people they phoned, and what exactly was said.

A guide price is just that and it doesn't mean a lower price won't be considered so if anyone is not viewing property with a guide price you are just missing out. Even if it says offers in excess of this doesn't mean a lower offer wouldn't work. There are so many properties out there overpriced and most often because the sellers think their house is worth more. It is not always the agents valuation. Agents just want to sell houses there is no sense in them constantly over valuing because the property will just sit there and not sell

If the EA have already got your house into the local paper (which will have a lead time of at least a couple of days) then they have obviously had the instruction to sell from you for several days, if not a week. Telling you they have a list of potential viewers and then not producing a single one on the first weekend is not good. In all my various house moves, the first weekend is crucial for getting people through the door for viewings and should be made up of the backlog of buyers on the EA books. If they don't have a list of people waiting, you are now dependant on any new buyers coming in through their door so you will only have viewings in dribs and drabs.

I would be in the EA office tomorrow asking what exactly is going on? Where are your promised viewers? How many have they actually contacted? Why have people not wanted to come view? How are they proposing to drum up interest?

I have to say that in regards to pricing, we went with the lowest end of the EA scale- we certainly didn't put it on for a vastly overinflated figure, and of course we're happy to reconsider the price too. I guess as all the EAs said the same price when valuing it ("in excess of") that was why we put that figure. We are happy to lower it and we were discussing the pros and cons of our house via the others that have recently sold but in terms of where it sits in the market, the price really does seems right. Perhaps its better to put on at £399,950 though.

They've had the instruction now for a good week and a half. Just discussing the responses here with DH and he suggested that perhaps we backed the wrong EA (it was down to two; both of which said that they had a list of potential buyers and the one we went with offered such a competitive deal that it would have been silly - at the time- not to). I can't really see though, once it goes on RM, how the EA makes a difference. For example, I've signed up with lots of agents in Oxford but would still continue to check RM or get the alerts through for when new properties came up so by my reasoning, it wouldn't make the tiniest bit of difference to me as a buyer which EA it was with. Am happy to stand corrected, but i'm not sure of the utility of taking it off with our current (after another week as no tie in) and putting it on with another.

I do have to say though, I think we did perhaps go with the wrong ones. I did ask them , mid week, where their list was, but got told until the photos were ready, noone wanted to come I then asked again and got told (as the EA sidled off very quickly) that it was a question of getting people looking in the nearest town to realised that they could get more value for their money down here. Not quite the long list they promised prior to instruction or the ready and waiting queue.

Anyway, I suppose this is by the by- as is now rightly pointed out, any that the EA knew would have at least expressed an interest by now, so it will be relying on people who come in dribs and drabs. The options are: 1. sit it out for another week or so and hope that we get some interest whilst asking what the marketing strategy is with our EA (we will do this anyway) 2. After the above then take it off and put it on with another EA and/or 3. Lower the price. It would be helpful if we could just have a couple of viewings - or even enquiries!- to establish the lay of the land a little better though

Have you not signed a contract? Ordinarily you are tied in with the agent for a minimum period (usually 12 or 16 weeks) before you can switch agents.

I think it depends on the strategy of the agent. When we bought this house, it hadn't got onto RM or newspapers yet but EA phoned me (knew I would be interested) so I was first to see it. Ended up going to final bids but taken off the market about 7 days after the phone call - so maybe 5 days since it'd been on RM. So in theory, you can still get to know about properties with alerts etc and viewing RM but the "service" you're supposed to expect from an EA is a) having a list of people ready but b) if someone says they'd like to view House A (not yours), they should also be saying "if you're looking for a big kitchen / 3 bed / family garden (whatever your house's main selling point), I'd recommend you viewing House B (your house) too".