Help! What are we missing with our house sale?

[GXDavid]

Hi Everyone,

We had sold our house but then got dropped three weeks before exchange. We have had some viewers and a lowball offer but haven't found that right buyer yet.

Our house is a 1928 Arts & Crafts style house in a private estate, ten minutes from the station/ shops and with a good selection of local private and public schools included a coveted catchment and distance to Dr Challoners grammar schools. The house is fully modernised (wiring, plumbing, heating, windows, kitchen and bathrooms) and is neutrally decorated apart from the kitchen/ dining room which is big enough to take quite a bold maroon colour that offsets the modern kitchen and flooring. For the local market we are on point re pricing , if not a little cheap. So my question is what are we missing?

If you look at the details - what is there that might put you off? Any comments very gratefully received as we feel like we have done everything we can to present the house but wonder if we are missing anything?

www.frostweb.co.uk/property-details/375332/buckinghamshire/gerrards-cross/the-queensway-1

Thanks and regards,

David

It's far too modern fort me. I'd have to spend a lot of money if I bought it. It doesn't feel cosy.

Also where are the photos of all the bedrooms. And is the study shown? I'm assuming pool table room is the family room. The photos don;t seem very proffessional to me. You have to work hard to get a feel for the layout and size of the house.

Our living room is zoned into a TV area (big sofa opposite the TV) and social area (two sofas around a coffee table and opposite the fireplace so I am intrigued by some of the comments regarding furniture layout

Yes I get that OP but can you see that in the photos - fish eye lenses always makes things look very spread out - that it doesn’t appear that way at all? It looks like furniture pushed to the back wall and a lot of empty space.

By the way, I’m sorry if my earlier comments stung. I really was trying only to be helpful. I wish you luck.

I just searched by postcode

What's GX?

I think you just need to change estate agents. They are taking the piss really. The 2 bedroom flats I have been looking at in Edinburgh have better and more photos than that. The fact they took that phot with the sofa throw and the pool table means they have no idea what they are doing. Do they not employ a professional house photographer who knows how to make the most of a property. At £1.5 million they should.
I think your house looks lovely. I but would worry that the lack of bedroom and bathroom photos mean they are awful. Only thing that would put me off personally is the fence. Fences cost money and means dealing with your neighbours you don't know. people can be weird about fences.
The house market has gone slowish round here. People think prices are going to fall so they are holding off. It might be different in your area.

I was going to say the same. This room is a corridor with a waiting room feel. It has no curtains or any large rug and there’s no feeling of a relaxing area at all. No tables with lamps, rugs and bookcases or cupboards. One mean looking central lampshade. It’s just devoid of interest. You can do something about this and you should. Get photos re done when you have changed things and improves the overall look. I would repaint the kitchen. I would relaunch with another agent possibly?

To be clear, I'm sure your bedrooms aren't awful.

Not enough photos. I'd expect to see a pic of each bedroom as if want to know how small the smallest bedroom is

GX is what local people call Gerrards Cross (X). It’s not the Chalfonts. GX has a distinct centre and a station. It’s very desirable and plenty of people earn good money there. People are also quite keen to retire there. The house prices can be big so trading down to £1.5m is possible.

Assuming you’re in a 1% fee with your EA, they have done an awful job for the £150k they will earn on that. The photos are awful which (as you’ve seen here) is leading to people making incorrect assumptions about the house. That video is also pathetic! I’m putting a property on the market for a lot less than yours (£240k) and even though it’s a pretty easy sell my EA has made a lot more effort!

Thanks again for eveyone's input and dressing suggestions. Obviously, with the time of year the back garden is difficult; I am a bit nervous cutting it too short until things warm up.

Some of the comments are very telling. We have a south facing garden so there is always plenty of light; looking at the picture it does look shaded and the back looks cluttered (since cleared).

We actually have quite a lot of colourful paintings but they don't seem to have been picked up.

Thanks,

David

@BlackCatsRule88

Assuming you’re in a 1% fee with your EA, they have done an awful job for the £150k they will earn on that. The photos are awful which (as you’ve seen here) is leading to people making incorrect assumptions about the house. That video is also pathetic! I’m putting a property on the market for a lot less than yours (£240k) and even though it’s a pretty easy sell my EA has made a lot more effort!

1% of £1.5m is £15k, not £150k!

It’s beautiful on the outside and I was a little disappointed with the inside, doesn’t have much arts and crafts character but will be to some people’s taste. Definitely need more photos.

It lacks character/charm. I don’t want house will a million Knick knacks but I would expect to see some design flair in the furniture, art, rugs etc.

I would pay a professional to come in and give you a staging lesson/consult.

You need more plants around the windows of the exterior of the house. Picture one and two, you need to wow people. Put a moss/natural window box under the far right window and have it FILLED with spring Planting. Things that trails and things that are colourful.
Get 2 standard bay trees, potted by your front door. Big ones. The the 2 boxus in the green pots you can use them with other potted plants to cluster around the rear patio. Have a cloth on your patio table and dress it for an out door gathering.

Take the trampoline out for the pictures. Mow the lawn! Clear the patio tiles. Borrow a pressure washer. If you can dig out a flower bed you could...but to buy enough “mature” plants would be costly. But worth it.

You’re selling a house and at that price point a “lifestyle”.

Use a huge rug to break up the flooring in the lounge. White Berber style. La redoute is a good place. Also get some potted plants for the whole house and use a variety of neutral plant pots to hold them.

Main bathroom. Plants and fancy toiletries.

The bedroom on show. Change the bedding for white. And a neutral throw.

Consider repainting the kitchen. Ammonite farrow aNd ball is nice.

The interior decor looks functional and cold. You need to get some copies of Elle decor or Living Etc and copy!!

It’s needs lots of softer colours, and lots of plants and basically warm it/soften it up considerably.

Good luck!

The photos aren't doing it justice - some are from an odd angle and others are just poorly framed. You might want to consider getting profressional shots done.

Also, lights on in the daytime always suggests a dark house, which is something that would put me off; and the pool table makes that room look cramped and more like a storage area than a games room / relaxation area.

Purely personal, but I wouldn't want to live on a private estate; as in our area this comes with a lot of extra costs and estate rules.

Good luck!

It is a beautiful house on the outside but the inside is ruined for me. If I were spending that kind of money and an arts and crafts style house I would be wanting original features. It is far too modern and tacky looking.

Sorry but to me it looks modern - I thought it was a new build

When an estate agent describes a period house as “sympathetically modernised”, it makes me want to look at it.

All the period features you list need to feel part of the house, they are not even visible except for the windows; and they look weird because there is nothing else to join them to the interior

I don't understand most of these comments. You aren't selling your furniture, your cushions or your pot plants. If I'm buying a house, I care that it is a) in the right place b) has the right number of rooms of the right size and c) at a price I am willing to pay. The idea that you redecorate/redo a house to sell it to someone who will almost certainly rip it all out anyway is horrifying, if only in environmental terms. No two people will agree on the colour of a kitchen, so why would you try to guess what a mythical buyer might like more than your own choice? If I excluded all the hideous dreary grey-painted houses that are currently fashionable, I wouldn't be able to buy anything!

There are lots of estates like this in the area. Most people like them! If you can afford this area any costs are not outrageous.

@AvengingGerbil

I don't understand most of these comments. You aren't selling your furniture, your cushions or your pot plants. If I'm buying a house, I care that it is a) in the right place b) has the right number of rooms of the right size and c) at a price I am willing to pay. The idea that you redecorate/redo a house to sell it to someone who will almost certainly rip it all out anyway is horrifying, if only in environmental terms. No two people will agree on the colour of a kitchen, so why would you try to guess what a mythical buyer might like more than your own choice? If I excluded all the hideous dreary grey-painted houses that are currently fashionable, I wouldn't be able to buy anything!

I understand this but people like me find it very difficult to visualise thing so I need to see that something will work with furniture etc. You need to make it easy for people to visualise what it will be like to live here.

I see beyond paint colours and tatty carpet (because I know carpet is cheap.) But oddly sized rooms, not being able to see a room fully/at all and a kitchen that is way out of character makes it harder.

The inside is the opposite to the outside and the photos are terrible, not every room and not enough angles.

It doesn’t flow, do you have to walk through the kitchen to the dining room? The sofas are against the wall, blocking the double doors to the family room, for it to be social you have to face each other, even using a sofa as a divider between the two zones would be an improvement. The social area would probably be better looking out to the garden.

And as others others have said the garden needs professional attention.

The kitchen sink as a room divider doesn’t look great and looks too far away from the ovens and hob to be functional in a working kitchen.

@AvengingGerbil For me the ceiling heights, features, room shape & proportions & flow are the most important. I can deal with decor & building work but a lot of people need to see themselves in it, show how they can live there if that makes sense.

Not enough photos so makes me think that if these are the 'best' rooms the rest must be awful.
The house does not look warm or inviting. Quite clinical. Have you already moved out?