Selling a concrete house - anyone got any experience or advice?

[newnamenewyear]

I live in a pre-cast concrete ex-council house. I own it outright -- I don't have a mortgage on it. I've been here a fair while.

I'd like to move now, but I don't know if I'll be able to sell. I plan to speak to some local agents, but I thought I'd ask here if anyone knows what to expect?

I understand PRC houses were easier to sell a few years ago but it's really hard to get mortgages these days, so it'd need to be a cash buyer, is that right?

Who would buy a concrete house for cash, is there a market for it?

I found some for sale on Rightmove, so I'm keeping an eye on them to see if they actually sell

This first one is similar in layout to mine, a 1930s council house (mine is more modern inside).

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/117861557#/?channel=RES_BUY

I also found these, all "cash only" PRC construction.

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/117586073#/?channel=RES_BUY

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/118292630#/?channel=RES_BUY

According to Property Tracker (a Chrome extension), this one's been on the market since June and they've knocked £50K off: www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/110935115#/?channel=RES_BUY

Can anyone offer any hope or am I screwed / stuck here?! I'd be grateful for any advice.

I suspect if brick built go for £290k you wouldn't get more than £190k if that. It's not just the construction being poor, but the lack of mortgagability means you're selling to a very limited market.

If your neighbour is selling then selling the pair to a developer sounds like a good course of action.

Not based on any experience though other than a keen property market watcher!

@Yarnivore

Have you thought about having it assessed by a structural engineer?

I believe you can get PRC houses certified and mortgageable, and this would probably be a better use of money than any interior updates.

Maybe I've misunderstood but from googling I think the only way you can do that is to basically reinforce the whole building, which is really expensive and often not worth it.

Getting a structural engineer for a look in sounds like a good idea.

Weirdly I can't find the house I suspect is concrete that sold locally on the sold lists.

I was pretty sure they sold it as they had a for sale sign, then there were workmen in doing loads of work, now a new family lives there. Maybe the owners couldn't sell and they've done it up and rented it out themselves. Or maybe I'm doing something wrong and it is there! I'll have another go at finding it later on...

I tried to buy one near me and the bank said no due to it being harder to resell :( shame because it was massive!
So if you find a cash buyer it's all good

@Limegreentangerine

I tried to buy one near me and the bank said no due to it being harder to resell :( shame because it was massive! So if you find a cash buyer it's all good

Would you have bought it if you had the cash?

@Cattitudes

How much land is around your house and do you think your neighbours might be interested in selling too if they are owner occupiers? I wonder whether if it was sold together possibly with outline planning permission for more than two houses (presuming you are in an area where land has some value) it might be worth more than just selling the house as it is.

How would I go about finding out if this was worthwhile? And if any developers would be interested?

We wouldn't be able to fit another house in, but two larger houses could be built. And I imagine it might not be hard to get permission as the house on the other side of my neighbour's is taller than ours, so it wouldn't be out of place.

At this point it's not something I'm very interested in, I'd rather just sell. And my neighbour would probably think I was bonkers if I started on about it now! But if we both find we can't sell our houses, I imagine we'd feel differently then.

Good to know this could be a back up plan.

There are a few round where we live. My understanding is that they are basically unmortgageable, though a specialist lender may consider it. That said though, they always sell quickly, usually to landlords who know they can get a good rental income from them as they are generous in size compared to many new builds and often have large gardens. I guess it depends on how much you need to realise from the sale. They go for considerably less than the ones that were rebuilt in traditional building materials, which can be mortgaged (the council offered this to some residents but not all took it up).

It would put me off as a buyer (not least because I would need a mortgage) but if I was buying to rent, it would not.

Down here in Cornwall a lot of concrete houses are made wholly or partially out of mundic (mining waste), so anyone who wants a mortgage has to get a mundic test because it degrades over time. I needed one for my last place but it was proper concrete block so is mortgageable. There are also the 'Cornish Units' which you see all over the UK; these are unmortgageable unless they have been shored up, as it were, with a brick exterior.

Mundic houses go for maybe 2/3 of their conventional equivalents, with a limited audience. It seems to mostly affect houses built in the first half of the 20th century but also older houses with extensions built around that time.

@newnamenewyear
Absolutely!!! It was HUGE and about 40k less than the same size houses going for round here ( south coast)

I'm curious, did you manage to sell the property or did you go with the PRC repair route?