Staying on the market or not

[Person123]

Me, DP and the dog live in our two bed terraced house in a town within commuting distance to London. We purchased it about 18 months ago and planned to stay for a couple of years and then move on to what would likely be our forever home.

We are now looking to move a bit sooner due to work promotion and wanting to get married and start a family. We started to see what is out there, saw something we liked and so put our place on the market. The place we liked is not happening (they want too much for it in our view) but we’ve kept ours on the market and considered some new builds slightly further away from where we are.

We’ve been on the market 8 weeks but had no offers and have made one price reduction (due to seeing the place we liked). We have had a fair amount of viewings - feedback has been we like the house but want off street parking or we are first time buyers and it’s one of the first places we have seen so want to see some more first. Nothing for us to improve on! The developer that we like can’t do part exchange and I’ve now served notice on our EA to terminate instructions because I’m getting a bit fed up. AIBU? Is stuff shifting but just taking longer to do so? Oh how easy it was being a first time buyer!

We’ve had really mixed feedback re the second room, not from any viewers but estate agents who initially said put a bed in but after viewing for valuations said no don’t bother, the room is plenty big enough. We had two local agents come out and value and both valued within about £5k of the other.

Regarding the comments on SDLT - on our house as a FTB this would be in the region of £5k.

The market is just so slow, particularly so close to the brexit date. We also live in a 2 bed terrace in a commuter town within 5 minutes walk to station and high street. We had our house on the market for a year when I was pregnant with baby no 2 and really struggled to sell despite lowering the price a few times and then our buyer pulled out. We have taken it off now and have spent some money on making it more sellable. It's clearly not ideal but possible to fit 4 of us in. No advice really, just think it's a really difficult market at the moment.

So your sale price is circa 400k.
Part of the problem for you will be ftbs seem to love buying with htb at the moment because they get bigger, newer and shinier for the same money that they have to put in upfront.
The downsizer market could be a better bet for your house
What has been the feedback from the viewings?

There are some new build flats near us with HTB but they are more expensive than our house. We haven’t had any downsizers come to see our house but it’s something the EA did mention. Feedback has been:

• we want offstreet parking
• it’s the first place we have seen
• it’s a beautiful house and is a case of just picking out the furniture
• the kitchen could be bigger (we have a galley kitchen and not much we can do about that!)

And variations of the same.

The house itself has a new bathroom and kitchen (installed by our predecessors) and we have redecorated the house and landscaped the garden (which was tiled over previously) so it’s actually a nice place to sit in.

Oh @person123 I could have written your response above.

Our constant feedback (before we price dropped) was; no off street parking, it’s gorgeous but too small, we’ve just started looking, etc etc. We dropped the price and had 3 offers within weeks.

This market? It’s all about price.

Those of you that dropped by what percent?

We have been in 3 weeks. Loads of viewings. No offers.

Moody I would say it depends what price you are on at
If you are on at 499k then not much point dropping if you are getting viewings
If you are on at 525k then dropping to 499k will open up a whole new bracket
Only people buying at the moment are bargain hunters

The 3 bed houses we have been looking at in the year and a bit we have had ours on and off the market are almost all still there. That's in a popular area with good schools and within 35 minutes of London. Most have dropped their prices and still aren't selling.

We dropped by 15k (from 475) this time, from 500 last year, and then accepted 450. So about ten % overall.

But we’re desperate to move but we’ve also got almost 20k off the asking off our onward purchase.

Oh and when we dropped to 460 we got 4 offers within weeks.

It’s 100% price sensitive in this market. It just depends on how much you want to move and what you can afford to drop to.

We're a London commuter town. Went on the market in July. Two very recent offers 100K and 85K shy of asking. Agent says it would have walked a year ago. We went with the agent who valued lowest as well as we wanted to be realistic. After a few weeks we agreed to 'reducing' by reference to a range. It's shit at the moment. We don't have to sell so will come off the market if the agent can't tweak the offers up a bit.

Worried... what percentage were those offers below asking... seems quite steep

@since2016 thats useful to know. We had it on higher for a couple of weeks (more of a test really) and then dropped it down so now we are closer to what we paid for it. Since the reduction we have been in a different price bracket and that’s definitely helped with the viewings.

Really so long as we can get what we paid (asking) + stamp paid by us + agents commission we would be happy. That gives us enough to buy a new place (which we have seen and want - 4 bed detached) and these figures seem to be in line with what it’s on at and different EA valuations.

Around here stuff is going but from my rightmove stalking is taking a bit of time to shift. Three bed semis are going after a few weeks and they’re around £600k if in decent condition and more like £500-550k if they need modernisation. These seem to be at the same level, possibly slightly higher but not hugely from the time when we bought.

What are the actual sales prices going through at though.
I would be surprised if you will get more than you paid, let alone with all of your costs on top.
People can easily see what you have paid and might be wary that you have issues with neighbours etc as you are trying to sell so quickly.

Alexalee - 850K asking. Started at 875K but now a range. One agent said 900 at the beginning. All 3 said 850 was the floor.

So offers of 750 and 785k!!! Hopefully they were opening bids

The first is a time waster but the second has been for 3 viewings so we will have to see where they go with that. It was only recent. I know it is a buyers market but heck, we're not desperate. We are downsizing and happy to go to rented until we find the right house/area. Might have to sit this one out for six months and hope for Brexit to implode on itself.

Actual sale prices have been asking and some over. There’s a 2 bed around the corner from us recently sold for £40k more than ours (but does have off street parking)

What are are you in person123?

We are in a 2 bed. At the time we bought we couldn’t stretch to a three or four bed but now we can. Our agent has also been clear to prospectively buyers that a move wasn’t on the cards, we’ve just had a couple of work promotions and now want to move up the ladder and start a family sooner.

When we bought our sellers had had a previous (higher) sale fall through and so remarketed. At the time we offered apparently they had another higher offer but we were more proceedable as FTB, mortgage in place, needed to vacate our rental and they were nearly ready to go with their onward purchase. We had pulled out of the first place we were going to buy and then saw this place and it just felt right.

We wanted to move in 2009 during the recession. It took us 6 months to sell (usually a very buoyant area of the west Mids) plus a large price drop. Luckily the sellers dropped their price too. Hang in there.