Open house or not?

[Timeforacatnap]

We been up for sale for a while, had a few viewings with a couple of them resulting in comments like interested but haven't sold their property so unable to move at present, so fair enough, we are in the same position! EA has suggested an open day, I'm in two minds about this, on one hand hand good to generate more interest (and maybe an offer) on the other worried about having excess people and security issues. EA says they can accompany viewings and have appointments based/registered buyers, but not sure, WWYD?

I wondered about doing one when putting house up for sale but worries it would just encourage people out for a nosey rather than genuine buyers. Not like going for a look around a show home just to see what it's like.

I think open houses work better at the beginning of a marketing campaign - if you're not getting that many viewings, where is the EA going to get several interested buyers for your open house ? Are you planning to lower the price and relaunch?

Generally by open house I would think the EA meant block viewings (ie getting as many people around on a certain day but giving them spaced appointments) work well: you only have to tidy up once and, if there are enough viewers, people who are serious feel under a little bit of pressure. Technically, however, open houses can mean any old tyre-kicker turning up if they see an ad in the paper to sneer at your soft furnishings and chat to the other people there.

We or rather our EA did the blocked viewings type open day when we were selling my parents' house three years ago. It was a typical 1920s house in an area popular with families looking for a forever home, but we initially mis-timed things by putting it on the market at the end of July. We dropped the price a little, then relaunched it with the EA arranging half a dozen back-to-back viewings that resulted in three offers of asking price or just below and a subsequent bidding war.

Otoh, when we sold our last house in 2014 we would never have opted for an open day, mainly because the house was a niche market type period rural property in an area where houses in our price bracket (mid range) didn't generate masses of interest, but also because we tend to buy the type of houses that attract the naturally nosey - have been there before and just knew an open day would bring them all out of the woodwork! It was a case of waiting for 'the one' buyer to come along - or so we thought, although as it happened we too received three offers in quick succession and accepted one at AP

I think if you're planning to relaunch with a new price it might be worth a punt, especially if yours is a popular style/type of property that is generally in demand.....good luck!

Thank you for your kind replies, I think that we will carry on with the traditional route for now and see how things go (smile)

Oops that should have been a

Our EA advised against it in a similar situation. They said it was just encourage nosey neighbours to have a look rather serious buyers.