Estate agents - just need to vent a tiny bit

[StiffyByng]

We put our house on the market a while back and no one wants it. Very quiet market, house is a bit quirky, not astonished, we'll live.

BUT as ever I have just been irritated beyond belief by the estate agents. We went with our lot because they seemed fairly realistic about it on the whole, but even they went with glowing praise about its great decor, amazing kitchen, garden, yada yada.

Every viewing we've had feedback on some aspect of the house and along the way it's now become accepted wisdom with them that the house has many flaws, most of them nothing we can address (see quirky), but some of them in direct contradiction to the benefits they identified when they valued it which they're now saying are issues we might need to address.

I just want an estate agent to offer a properly honest opinion when they value it, especially in a tricky market, so you have some shot of pricing it right to take the issues into account and even sorting some things out in advance. Instead you just get timewasting flannel, and then a long drip drip of 'well, it IS a tricky garden' which wears away at your very soul.

We've taken it off today - were planning to do so after one last viewing - and the feedback was 'a definite no, given the amount of work that needs doing, as they're expecting a baby'. A few weeks ago we were told our house (much extended/fiddled with) was in great condition with everything that could be done to it already done. The passage of time has been cruel to my house over the last two months clearly! The year I spent getting to know my builders and their family was for nothing it seems.

Which zone? I love quirk!

And I'm currently sitting in a loft conversion and slowly boiling to death
It's 32 already today

I'm really surprised to hear that the market is slow where you are. I have been trying to buy a property for months now - and have had 3 asking price offers and 1 over asking price offer rejected!

I have noticed a big shift in the dynamic of the market since the 30th June (even though no one buying in June was ever going to make the stamp duty deadline). Agents seem pushier and the number of properties coming on has slowed.

If you've taken it off for a couple of weeks, could you take the opportunity to overhaul the listing? Do a bit of a shunt around of furniture to make the photos most appealing and work out the perspectives that will make the garden look best (and also make it clear what the garden is like). Make sure the dimensions are on the floorplan and that any architectural quirks are pointed out on the floorplan.

The listing is fab. As should be the case, it looks like an amazing house! It's the price that's the issue. (I feel like this is the reverse of the normal property thread.)

It's zone 2/3 borders, near gorgeous parks, good primaries, decent secondaries, a short walk to bars'n'restaurants'n'OliverBonas and an orange line station (never sure if that can be described as the tube).

You couldn't reflect the quirks on a floorplan. But we've briefed the agents to warn people in advance of viewing that they can't do a loft conversion.

I get your EA frustration.
And the market has been dead since about the end of May - everyone who was even thinking of buying and selling had done so earlier, wfh forever seemed less likely etc etc.

I suspect that once people start needing to move for new jobs etc things will pic up to their natural pace again.

If all the EAs you interviewed said much the same thing, they may have been caught by surprise. They seem to be natural optimists and start high and then see what happens.

Your house sounds great - the Overground (orange line) is fantastic.

The listing is fab. As should be the case, it looks like an amazing house! It's the price that's the issue. (I feel like this is the reverse of the normal property thread.)

Do you have a sense of the type of person you will probably end up selling to?

As a fellow quirky home owner I feel your pain! Ours has a bonkers layout which suits us, suits older kids etc but wouldn't suit a family with small children.. or anyone with mobility issues.

But it has a ton of wow features so the agents were all about the wow and told the potential buyers jack shit about the odd layout or filtered them by who the house suits.

So they'd turn up and go "oh but it's the wrong way around and doesn't work for my 2/3 year olds" yes like the brochure tells you!

It drove us potty.

With regarding to pricing too high... I think estate agents are struggling with pricing right now. The market is so volatile. Some houses are going for 100k what they went for last year and others just aren't shifting, however many times they are reduced. I know EAs are supposed to be the 'experts' but nobody can really know for sure what the correct pricing is in this current crazy climate. What even is realistic? That's anybody's guess at the moment. We viewed a beautiful property a few weeks ago that I thought was well priced to begin with... but it has not sold and has just been reduced.i love it and it it was only in thr catchment for our favourite school we would buy it in a heartbeat. But one we really wanted, and we're keeping our eye on hoping it would be reduced has just sold. If they got any where remotely near asking, I would consider that overpriced (but again, a house is only worth what someone is willing to pay).

This has been an interesting and helpful thread, rather than the rant I was thinking of. Thanks, all.

Our house has been tenanted for a while as we've been abroad, and it's been lived in quite happily by a family with two children. It's very liveable - very big kitchen, two bathrooms, two receptions (could easily be knocked through but currently the middle room is a good playroom), and it's a natural three bed house which someone divided into four - an issue as it's not four double bedrooms. So you haven't got the big front bedroom you get in that sort of house normally. But it would take a weekend to knock down the dividing walls and get it back - otherwise it's a smaller front bedroom and a single bedroom/study with storage. So the issue is that you can't create a four double bedroom house by doing a loft conversion because of the architectural quirk - it's three doubles and a single, or three doubles.

It does have a drive (hen's teeth round here), is on a quiet road, F&Bed throughout (by our tenants, one of whom was an instagrammer and got a free interior designer to do most of it). The garden, while terraced, is a decent size for the area, and not particularly overlooked, and south facing. It's pretty and well maintained, and room for a garden office at the bottom.

So we loved living there, but it's a bit small with three bigger kids. A two child family would be very comfortable there, and our tenants had an au pair too.

@cantrememberagain

As a fellow quirky home owner I feel your pain! Ours has a bonkers layout which suits us, suits older kids etc but wouldn't suit a family with small children.. or anyone with mobility issues.

But it has a ton of wow features so the agents were all about the wow and told the potential buyers jack shit about the odd layout or filtered them by who the house suits.

So they'd turn up and go "oh but it's the wrong way around and doesn't work for my 2/3 year olds" yes like the brochure tells you!

It drove us potty.

That would drive me round the bend too.

Did they also take photos of random items of furniture in your house? They sound like the type.

@StiffyByng - it sounds like it is in SE London? I am local if so and have worked as an EA in the area (I don't any more, but I do have a few year's experience) would be happy to look at it and give my thoughts if you want? You could pm if you don't want to put the link on the thread? Not being nosy, just offering a second opinion if you want it! No worries at all if you don't want to.

That's interesting, thanks. I wonder if we know each other as I've bought and sold in the area a few times. From posts of yours in the past (your username sticks out - I'm not a stalker or doing Advanced Search on you) I think we're very local to you.

The listing is now dead though so nothing to share. I would happily track you down and take advantage of your knowledge if we go back on the market though, thank you.

Have you considered using The Modern House, who despite the name don't just do MCM, but rather period, quirky homes?
People looking on there are expecting quirk tbh

It's not quirky enough unfortunately. Also, and this is why I'm being unspecific about it, if we brought it to attention, it might result in our house being listed apparently, and I can't face trying to sell an otherwise not massively distinguished terraced house that is randomly listed. Can you imagine?

Ah, awkward!
Commiserations

I love quirk and your house sounds lovely, but I suspect the big problem is people can’t visualise the problems even if pre-warned, and will come and see it thinking, “Oh, I’m sure we could still convert the loft/do an extension despite the slope” and only realise on inspection they can’t. And in the current high-price market, with people looking for much bigger homes or homes they can make much bigger to simultaneously live in and WFH, no one wants a house where you can’t go up into the loft or out into the garden to create the space.

I’ve just seen you saying there is room for a garden studio at the bottom of the garden, though – I would 100% invest in putting one in, F&B it like the rest of the house (maybe even ask your former tenant for help for the same Instagrammy vibe?) and there you go, it’s a 3-bed, 2-office house, which makes up for the lack of loft/extension potential. My “instant save” Rightmove trigger goes into overdrive for houses that already have WFH spaces sorted.

We've already extended the house - the kitchen is massive. And there's scope to extend further on the ground floor too if wanted - the issue with the sloping . But yes, the value-add re sleeping accommodation is limited, and we know that - that's why we wanted the price to reflect the limitations!

The issue with the sloping garden is just that it's not flat, but it doesn't restrict use of the house at all. You can dig it out more than we've already done if you want to.

I had the most ridiculous feedback when selling our last house even when I I significantly dropped the price.

They wanted four bedrooms (it had three); the kitchen was small; the garden was small; the loft wasnt extended; it didnt have side access; they could get a bigger house for the same money in a cheaper area.

I would price it to be very competitive with others that have sold. Our first EA overpriced our house by £50k.

They are a strange breed EAs.

In all fairness to EA, when I worked with one, our demanded that feedback was provided about every viewing, even if the viewer refused to provide feedback, so often we would just make it up otherwise we got penalised at work. This might explain why it doesn’t always make perfect sense

That’s not really in fairness to EAs, is it? As a concept rather than individuals, it’s another bit of bad practice.

When they are valuing it, they are also pitching to sell your house so they need to be positive. Otherwise they’ll loose out to an agent who is really positive about your property

Not in this case they wouldn't. It's frustrating that they won't respect a request for a realistic valuation. There's lots to be positive about in my house, but I really wanted an honest opinion. I don't want to be sold to, I want them to work for me.

What I’m saying is the general day to day EA’s and the ones you contact have very little control over what is happening and are often forced into things that are clearly bonkers, it’s the managers/those higher up who are instructing weird practices