Was the House Doctor right all along?

[Kirstiesshirtdress]

Name changed for this.

I’m selling a house that has been rented to tenants for ten years.

It’s a fixer upper. The estate agent has been told to market it as a fixer upper, to people who want a project. The EA put it on for an unrealistic price this summer, claiming that there was “plenty of interest at that price”. It’s a 3 bed Victorian terrace in a nice village in West Yorkshire. I made him drop the price a couple of weeks ago, by £30k, despite his protests that he was “confident of selling the house this year”. The low number of viewings, and the feedback, suggested otherwise. It’s still not shifting, even at the lower price.

It’s not a wreck, but it’s tired. Of course it is: it’s been tenanted for ten years, that’s why we’re selling it as a fixer upper. It’s on for £45k less than the top price that houses on the same terrace have sold for this year. It’s on at offers over £220k. Done up identical houses on the same terrace have sold for £265k.

My question is this: do buyers really want a true fixer upper, or do they expect to buy a house described as a fixer upper and only have to spend £500 on it to make it perfect?

Our experience suggests the latter, and that the House Doctor (Anne Maurice…yes, I am old enough to remember her) was right all along. In other words, forget showing a house that needs a bit of work, because buyers can’t be arsed and you’re going to have to do it yourself so that buyers can “imagine themselves in the house” blah blah.

That’s an outcome I was kind of dreading because I’ve got no time for supervising effing house renovations. I don’t need to sell, just can’t be bothered with being a landlord any more. I’m flexible on price, hence the £30k reduction, but I don’t want to sell for a derisory amount, less than what I paid for it in 2006.

The feedback since the price drop is that, despite more viewers and the house being explicitly described on Rightmove as ‘in need of modernisation’, the viewers are all carping about “having to do too much work”, and that they wouldn’t make an offer at all, even below the reduced asking price!

The house has a damp cellar, like all of the houses on the same terrace. It needs redecorating and recarpeting. The kitchen is original (as in Victorian cupboards, not avant garde). The bathroom is early nineties, and is quite tired. I can’t see the value in redoing a kitchen and bathroom just to sell the house, because surely buyers would want to fit their own, to their own taste?

What do you think? Is it worth doing up a fixer upper yourself to shift the bloody thing, or persevering in the hope that a buyer comes along who understands what the phrase ‘fixer upper’ means, and is prepared to do the work in exchange for a good price?

I've bought genuine fixer uppers three times (first one: needed gutting as had been trashed by former tenants, e.g. garden full of old mattresses and broken glass... second one: liveable but needed new kitchen and bathroom, completely redecorating... third one: needed new floors, heating, plumbing, wiring, the decor was the least of it!).

If I were moving now, I'd look for one needing zero work - I'm tired! So I'd say maybe it depends on the life-stage of your buyers? I think a lot of buyers right now are moving because they're fed up of their own homes from lockdown - so they maybe want something that looks better than their current place?

Love the Dinnerladies reference.

So you’re suggesting that actually, the pool of people willing to take on a project is pretty small, despite what the estate agents say?

I guess I'm wondering if people are a bit risk averse at the minute? I'm finding it's very tough to hire staff at work right now, for example, because people with jobs don't want to move and lose their employment security.

If you're not in a rush, I'm sure you will find someone who is happy with a project - but if you need it sold, it might be worth painting it and decluttering it. Twenty years is obviously a good age for a bathroom and I can see why you wouldn't want to invest in a new one - perhaps just replace all the sealant etc so it's clear it's well maintained and functioning?

(Dinnerladies is my happy place )

I think that prices have risen across most of the market and most people just don't have the cash to fix a place up, as they've had to sink all savings into a greater deposit/bigger leap from their last house.

(Ahem, thirty years - I'm in denial about how long ago early nineties was!)

I would personally be perfectly happy to buy a tired but serviceable house at a cheap price. That's exactly the kind of thing I'd be after - it's what I can afford, and I have a pretty high tolerance to living with weird or old decor so wouldn't need to do everything all at once. (And nor would I be able to afford to - if I could, I'd be able to buy one of the already-fixed-up ones.) So, buyers like me do exist!

Going back to the House Doctor thing, though; they always spent very little and just did a few key things to make the properties more appealing. They weren't, as I recall, fitting whole new kitchens or whatever - it was a lick of paint and maybe a bit of new carpet. If you were to throw a few hundred at it, could you tackle a few of the things that might be putting buyers off? Or maybe make just one bit of the house have a little bit of wow about it?

(Obligatory request for the link...)

I thought she was more about decluttering (emptying it of all personal touches) cleaning and painting it, and making sure each room showed it's purpose (e.g. table in dining area, single bed in that room you used as a study.) But no major renovations?

I think in this market, especially at this price point and in the north where prices have sky rocketed in the last 12 months, some people who were open to a ‘fixer upper’ are finding that these new house prices leave people with no money left to do the fixing. Add into that the significant lead times on labour and inflation in material prices, this is a financially risky time to be dipping toes in renovation unless you have comfortable savings. People are also dealing with a mindset problem, because last year the same budget would have bought a sparkling house, and now it only buys something like your fixer upper. Is your house currently tenanted? One consideration is that you ideally do not want to leave it empty over winter or it may create new problems.

For the sake of a few quid spent now, you could get more money for the house a little later on. I'd do it up a bit if I had the money.

Realistically how much would need spending on it to bring it up to the standard of the surrounding houses that are worth £265k? Is it just a kitchen & bathroom or does it need totally gutting, rewiring, replumbing, damp proof course, new windows & doors? Would someone need to spend nearly £45k to get it up to standard? My first house was a wreck when I bought it for £34k, but after just putting in a new kitchen, bathroom, decorating, carpeting, flooring & sorting out the wreck of a garden which cost around £10k was worth £55k. It depends what kind of property it is, is it something that first time buyers usually go for or is it more than likely the next step up the property ladder, first time buyers are often more limited on what they can afford but someone with a property to sell would be able to find the money to spend on renovations.

Not currently tenanted, no. It’s empty because I let it unfurnished. It’s decision time: rent it out again, do it up over the winter ready for the spring market or sell it ASAP for whatever someone will pay (and none of the viewers so far have been inclined to make any kind of offer!)

The EA declares himself mystified that it hasn’t sold yet, because the location is good. I’m inclined to think that it’s an estate agent problem rather than a buyer problem! As in, he can’t read the market, has overestimated the number of people looking for a fixer upper, and doesn’t know what the right price should be.

Book decorator. Get the whole place painted magnolia.
Book carpet fitter. Get basic beige/grey carpets throughout.
Change estate agent.
Remarket.

There are still bucket loads of property developers willing to buy shells.

To widen your market I agree with a pp that it's worth making it look livable to widen your pool to include families willing to fix up slowly over time. How much to replace carpets and paint the main reception room and bedroom and dress the space to show what furniture would fit? Showing the main bedroom will fit a double with space around it.

I have recently turned a 3 bed into five bed and not many people have that kind of imagination. Maybe get some planning permission as even that can add heaps to its value. Off street parking or a extension out the back for a diner kitchen?

I'm in a similar position with a previously long term tenanted but now needs work house. The estate agent was sure it would sell quickly but we've ended up with a series of buyers pulling out for various reasons and reduction in price. We've now decided to go down the auction route just to get it sold. Is that an option for you?

I would try a lick of paint, and then stage it with some nice furniture and a few pictures.

A friend was selling last year in the peak, in a popular area, everything had been done to it but it was completely empty. Price had to be dropped really low to sell it. Eventually sold, many many months later, and the buyers staged it and put it straight back in the market at a higher price!

I really think viewers need to imagine themselves there and shown what it could be like with a bed, sofa, table in it. I wouldn’t do the bathroom, kitchen etc.

In our area, probably at the top end of the FTB price range. Viewers so far, one of whom was in the building trade but rejected it because he wanted 3 dedicated car parking spaces (with a Victorian terrace???) have said that they would need to spend £30k to bring it up to their preferred spec.

The windows are fine. The doors are OK, serviceable. It has a three year old boiler and a three year old woodburner. Needs a lick of paint and new carpets, and the cellar would need to be tanked to make it usable.

A buyer would want to fit a new bathroom and maybe ponce up the kitchen a bit (although I thought that anyone buying a Victorian terrace stuffed with original features wouldn’t necessarily want to rip out a Belfast sink and original cupboards in favour of an IKEA kitchen, but who knows!).

I’d be reluctant to do a new kitchen and bathroom because everyone has their own taste with those things, and if I fitted a new bathroom a buyer might want to rip it out anyway!

I hate estate agents trying to sell me a house that has been done up to sell as it's usually a cheap patch and we'd have to do it all again anyway. We're putting right what I have called a house doctor special (I adored that programme), I'd rather they'd left it as it was.

Yes! HD was right. My Victorian flat in London needs work and after a year of pulled out of sales, I've put it on auction, sold as seen, gone at the end. My logic is the people at auction will know what they want/ can do and won't dick around like people who buy it and then realise that yes, actually, it is a bit of work...

I'd probably sell without doing it up. Some
People do like a project and fixer uppers give them the scope to do it up how they want. It depends how much time you have and how much you'd enjoy doing it up (and it doesn't sound like you would!). Also worth remembering that the cost of labour is high at the moment and there are long waits for it as well.

I think rocketing inflation is going to imminently put downwards pressure on house prices. I’d lower the price and get it off your hands!

It’s interesting to hear about other people’s experiences of selling houses or flats in need of work.

The EA is keen for us to go down the auction route (auctioned by them, of course, for lavish fees charged to the buyer, reducing the bids!) but I can’t help feeling that it will result in a sale at a crappy price. That’s because to buy at auction you need to have the cash ready, rather than mortgage finance, so our market would be developers looking to buy the place for a song.

I don’t need the money now, so feels like I’d be selling myself short by going to auction when I might be better doing it up a bit then selling on the open market.

I wouldn't buy anything needing work due to the difficulty of getting materials and decent tradesmen at the moment. It's a nightmare and I can't see an end in sight.

Either;

1. Lower the price
2. Paint, recarpet, replace bathroom

I'm nearing the end of a house renovation - my second big project - and I'm never, ever doing it again! Finding reliable tradespeople, sourcing materials, dealing with the disruption...you couldn't pay me enough to do this again frankly. And atm most housebuyers are not able to pay the hugely inflated house prices AND then pay £££ for renovations.

If it'll be worth 265 once it's done up, and you want offers over 220, maybe people don't think it's worth the effort of it needs new bathroom, poss kitchen and complete redecoration. It could cost £30k to do it nicely. No developer will take that risk for £15k.