No offers on our house

[housetales]

Our house has been on the market for 2 months - launching as the school holidays started which I think was a huge mistake - with what I'd describe as a handful of viewings (mostly right as it went live).

The price it's been listed at was the agent's price, not ours, and when compared with others locally, doesn't seem OTT. All the agents who came round gave similar valuations too. No viewers have said upon viewing it that it is overpriced either.

We had only one bit of negative feedback and it was only from a couple of viewers, not all - that we are overlooked from the side of our property - so we purchased some 10ft trees to allay that concern.

I'm putting myself out there with a link to see what you guys think so be gentle! Should we stay on the market or take it off for now? I should say we only went on the market as we fancied a project for our forever home and were told there was a massive opportunity in our price range as there is such limited supply.

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/110082437#/?channel=RES_BUY

average house, crazy price

It's a lovely house but it feels like it needs some colour.
Maybe some sort of wow factor!

You can rent furniture etc from people who stage houses. Might be worth getting someone in. I do know someone in Yorkshire that does this but I'm sure there will be something more local

Honestly, the kitchen and bathroom are disappointing.

Firstly it's lovely but I'm now going to rip it to shreds so don't be offended!

It's over priced. It's a big modern house on a small plot, plus is very magnolia, lots of empty space inside, the light fitting up the stairs is dated, bathrooms are dated.

I don't like the kitchen, the vertical oven seems to end in mid air, a range cooker and an island would bring it together better.

I assume it was built early 2000's and not touched since?

But it is a lovely house! For the price though it needs to be presented as a finished modern article or price dropped to reflect that it's dated.

OP, you're placing far too much value on your house not having any road noise. You've mentioned it a number of times. Listen to what people are telling you - the house doesn't have the features or wow factor to command the kind of price you are asking for.

I don't know what it is about it, something I can't quite put my finger on. It is beautiful but it's almost too show homey, doesn't look lived in, like it's straight out of the pages of an interior design magazine. It looks a bit stuffy and uptight rather than inviting and cosy/comfortable.

But maybe I'm jealous that I couldn't ever afford a house of that size lol.

I think this is such an interesting thread. In terms of answering the OP, I think it needs to be dressed a bit more with texture, odd splash of colour and house plants.

I think you might fall between two stalls. It’s not classic / traditional and it’s not by modern. I agree that people after executive new builds are after a wow factor. At 16 years old, it’s not new, but not old enough to have been updated.

For myself, it’s making me wonder about how it’s best to do things in our house. We’re not even close to that price range, but I don’t want to spend £40k on bathrooms and a kitchen that will be considered dated in only 16 years! Maybe it’s best just to stick with timeless to avoid this, but then I struggle to know what timeless is!!

Lovely house OP! I do wonder if its the price maybe? Are there other similar homes a little cheaper around .Somewhere something is amiss .Maybe ask a couple of EAs for some honest feedback

I was interested that someone else picked up on the ‘missing’ window at the back. It looks so strange to have a huge blank walk when a window would have been amazing.

It doesn't look loved and it's not particularly functional I think that's the problem.

There are no pictures on the walls, nothing has been updated since 2004. No pot plants or plants in the garden. The fences havent even been painted. It look like you haven't really lived there or invested but now want to whack on almost a million. The hot tub and decking are not to my taste and for that price I would want a decent attractive looking patio for table and chairs, decking is a cheap substitute and had its day.

I live in a new build gated development of similar era. Some neighbours tried to sell having not updated anything since 2005 and couldn't despite other neighbours having sold easily (who had).

I personally find new build very difficult to make stylish and homely as they are featureless and boxy so you really need to bring them to life or they are just soulless developer houses.

I imagine in the price range you are going to be waiting longer than cheaper houses.
The houses around the price near us have always seemed to take longer to sell than a more medium priced house.

I agree with comments about the kitchen no looking as modern or fancy as you might expect for a house that price.

I also wonder about the decor and furniture.. Not sure how to phrase this but it looks like it’s decorated and furnished with items you’d expect in a normal midrange house rather than items you’d expect in a house of this size and price. I hope that doesn’t sound rude, because the house and furniture looks beautiful to me, but I’m wondering how it might be viewed by buyers who are used to expensive houses.

Is there a houses dressing service available anywhere?

Lovely but again not in my budget so havnt got much to say haha..

You mention you don't like period properties and instead want modern - I think most people want one or the other. Your house is unfortunately just in the middle, it's certainly not modern but it's not period either. It's just a bit dated. I know that sounds blunt but you asked for opinions

Sorry OP but it's dated, lacking in character and overpriced for what it is. But am sure if you lower the price, it will be snapped up as it's clearly a well-maintained house in a good location.

This is my advice.
Back off for now, get some potted plants, put up some pictures on the walls, paint in a different color, that sort of thing. House needs some color and wow factor etc to impress buyers.
Then re assess and sell it.

@HandScreen

It's nice, but a pretty standard detached boxy house, albeit big. It's not a £1.3m house.

Is that because you have done some research on house prices in the area or are you an EA? Or is it because it’s not your taste. What a useless comment. Not sure why people are commenting on price and then saying they don’t really know that area or would prefer more for that price but in a completely different area. Not helpful to OP, when you have no clue what you are talking about.

I think from the outside your home is stunning , I'm not a fan of the kitchen though..... for that price I'd be expecting a lot better .
Good luck x

Forr 1.3 million I’d want something with character and serious wow factor and this just looks a nice, albeit plain, big house to me. But the area sounds good.

I haven't read all the comments but I did a search on schools. The nearest state secondary is rated 'requires improvement' and although there are other secondaries a bit further away with better ofsted ratings, they are oversubscribed. This may be putting some people off maybe?

I’m not your target market (wrong area, I like period properties and lots of colour and cosiness), but a few things struck me on the 3D tour:

The kitchen as others have mentioned – I can cope with dated and would happily paint cabinets, paint the french doors black, zhoozh it up, but the layout is exceptionally poor: fridge freezer in the utility, and ovens right next to the door with no countertop alongside to put hot trays down (I would not want to lift something onto that top counter above them!). The counter next to the microwave is tucked behind the door. I’d worry about my kids coming through that door while I was cooking and had the ovens open. There’s very little counter space for the size of the house.

The bathrooms are a bit grubby, sorry — the showers all have that weird orange mould stuff and feel quite tired/cheap – even details like the shower hose/cord being tangled up should be sorted out.

Going outside on the 3D tour it’s clear how little privacy you get for the £1.3m price tag – I assume it’s part of estate rules not to have fences etc at the front, but the photos give one impression, of privacy, then I imagine on viewing, people realise how cheek-by-jowl the house is to its neighbours. You can’t put the bins out in your nightie, and as pp pointed out, you’re opposite the gates so get all the estate traffic.

Garden is blah. I don’t think the size is bad (I’ve got a London terrace garden and used to live in Brighton, so I’m used to much smaller), but it’s just a square box of lawn and makes me worry there’s no planting because it might have poor new build soil on top of rubble.

Price! You can’t go by what’s on the market, but by what’s actually sold. The Rightmove market information tab shows 4- to 5-bed detacheds within 0.1 miles for £600-850k. The only comparable price to yours is the one linked back on page one with the white and blue frontage and a much more landscaped garden. You say prices have risen by 10% in your area but the pandemic “more space panic” property bubble is coming to an end – I think you’ve missed the boat.

Buyers have so much information now and will want to know what justifies the insane jump in price from last sale in 2004.

Honestly think you need to drop below £1m at least, and/or get stagers in – at your current price bracket people who like new builds would expect a proper Trump Towers WOW new build with shiny, high-end materials, not vinyl flooring, which would be a huge investment to make, so you could go the other direction and have it decorated and staged to be a bit more warming and soulful.

It will be the price. There appears to have been a mini-boom, mainly driven by Londoners/SE not needing to be in the office every day and moving further out from London. That seems to have calmed down. Just looking on Rightmove, there's a property near you which although more dated, has a swimming pool and has the potential to build a second property on and that's been reduced to £1.1 Million.

You're being very good about all these comments and taking it well. Well done you. But in the end I do think it is the price point with what needs to be done on your albeit very nice house, but very dated aspects of it.
Full overhaul of the kitchen with bifolds - all together pricey
If you have bifolds there, then what about the other patio doors?
All bathrooms redone as very dated
Decent oak (or similar) real wood flooring
New carpets and redecorate throughout (fairly standard for anybody)
Landscaping of the garden as absolutely no established back garden

All those elements come at a cost and frankly I can't help but think your price point is too punchy to do all of those things. If I have that amount of money to spend I don't want an "old, somewhat dated new build" on an estate which is overlooked.

Somebody will certainly want your house as it's got a good footprint. But at your square footage and your price point I can't do anything about being seriously overlooked by the other house (that's my choice as to whether I can live with that or not) but I've got to spend tens of thousands of pounds into the £100s to update all those things on a currently priced £1.3m modern old/newbuild estate.

This then returns me to the price point. Some people will not be able to cope with being so overlooked so that will rule it out for them. Others won't want to do the level of work to bring it up to scratch. Some will if the price is right!!

Don’t panic, September is a great month to sell, people want to be in new home by Christmas

People who like new build don’t want to be replacing kitchens and bathrooms.
We lived in a 2002 Taylor Wimpey 4 bed ex show house and fixtures look identical - laminate kitchen top, dated tiles with border, curtain pelmets and coordinating cushions.
I think you either do work or seriously look at your pricing. There’s a nice sort after estate near here and some houses have original 20 year old fixtures some with replaced and the redone houses always sell more quickly for more money. A bit dated looks worse in a new build than an older house.
If you look on Instagram you can see how houses like yours are made more modern or go and look at some show homes.
Also is yours first house near gates? I’d still be wary of letting young children play unsupervised as they could dash out when gates open or be run over by neighbour in Range Rover - gated might not have quite the premium you think.

Sorry to be brutally honest but I think it’s completely devoid of character and a bit “footballers’ wives”.

However, every house will sell at the right price.