Selling my house

[MrsBallen]

Hello.

Just wondered if anyone had any advice or opinions.

I've got my house on the market at the moment with Strike, an online estate agent. I was considering a private sale but figured I needed to get it on Rightmove so this type of estate agent was a good option for me.

It went on the market 2 weeks ago. I had quite a few viewers in the first week but not so many in the second week. Two people have made offers but neither of them is ready to proceed as they haven't sold their houses yet. My house is not a first time buyers house, it's a 4 bedroom family home.

I am starting to worry because of the lack of viewing requests. I spoke to a couple of estate agents before settling on the online one. However the estate agents that I spoke to have come back and tried to get my business by saying I should have sold my house by now and they will put my house on the market etc etc.

It's really stressful and I don't want my house to be on the market forever! I thought houses were selling really well at the moment. My house is in very good condition, it's clean and well maintained, nice area, good schools nearby, and reasonably priced compared with other houses in the area. So I don't understand it. Is it still too early to start worrying?

I don't really want to change estate agents as this will just cause me more stress and worry. Just looking for some opinions from people who have been through this recently.

I wouldn’t panic just yet and agree with the posters saying the market isn’t as fast in your area as in other places and that the market is slowing. Searching for what has sold that has been listed in your area in last 2 weeks shows not a lot has.

Our house went on last Friday, no viewings at all. Summer last year we had a goodoffer on day 3 (they couldn’t get mortgage due to their personal circumstances so fell through)Just had a look here in my postcode in last week and only 1 house listed in last 7 days has gone under offer so it’s not as busy here as in some places.

We’ve had awful weather since storm Eunice, lots locally haven’t had power and lots of people are away for half term. I think waiting for a couple of weeks before making any decisions is sensible.

I think it probably is the downstairs layout. Your living room only seems to contain 2 armchairs? That's unusual in a 4 bed house. The conservatory looks a bit bleak (sorry!). I do wonder why people have conservatories if they don't keep plants in them.

There are no back garden pics and the house doesn't have much kerb appeal. It could all be improved with better photos and less severe staging. I think you might have decluttered a bit too far.

Having said that about the slower market, the building you are next to is off putting, I would need to see pictures of garden as that’s really important to me, the downstairs layout is off putting as is no sofa in the living room.

It looks like it backs onto a very busy A road so that would put me off - the fact there's no back garden picture would make me suspicious it is very close to the the house and that's why no picture was included (might not be true, but I'm coming at it from the pov of a potential buyer browsing online).
I can't work out the function of the lounge. Two arm chairs facing a wall? It is unusable because it acts as a through route for the other ground floor rooms? As that's the impression it gives. New pictures with whichever EA you go through need to stage this room staged as a proper lounge.
Too many random picures of hallways and landings there's a virtual video amd face to face viewings are back so they're unnecessary now.
It's clean tidy and functional, but straight away I'm calculating costs of new bathrooms and resolution of potential issues with conservatory (cold ime). I don't know the area and market, have those been reflected in the price?

I have seen some lovely properties over the years but location is key. Being next to a cricket club needs to be sold as far as possible as a plus rather than a wtf is that next door in the first picture.

I also agree that the layout and no sofas in the living room will be putting people off. Too many internal pictures and not enough of the outside. Your kitchen is nice so a couple of shots of that room is good and remove the almost duplicate. But the bathrooms are letting it down so I’d only have one of the bathroom and ditch the one of the downstairs loo for example. And the ones of the utility aren’t great. Choose one. For the amount of photos of the internals, I’d expect 3 of the back garden including one of the back of the house for balance. But overall there are too many pics so I’d not increase the overall number.

Four of the living room for example is ridiculous. I like the one centred on the fire and the other with the double doors onto the dining room. You really don’t need more than one photo of the smaller bedroom. The same for the rest of the pictures. The photos are to give a flavour of the house so cull around 50% of them and add the garden shots with an emphasis to open land at the back. You have a 360 of the entire house. Shame that doesn’t include the garden as you appear to have the open cricket fields at the back, which is a big selling point and could go some way to counteract the unfortunate price differential you will expect by being next door to that building.

Other thoughts..

Right now you have a 3 bed plus office and unloved conservatory. The white cabinet looks like kitchen units and the black thing looks like the bottom of a gas fire. All this screams not enough storage space when in fact there is enough for most people.

If I was going to dress your house to sell, I’d put the sofa from the conservatory in the living room. I would also dress bed 4 as a bedroom even if that means removing those wardrobes and make the conservatory a multifunctional room including office (be mindful of wires, they look atrocious).

Idk how big your office stuff is but ideally I would want to remove the white unit, put one of the living room chairs in the conservatory, possibly add something like a beanbag chair and small side table. Wfh is a big thing now and how lovely to work with the garden as a backdrop.

I get you are not going to change carpets or bathrooms but selling houses is selling a lifestyle so if you have some garden furniture, I would put the table and chairs out.

Picture without the wmc would be a start

Sorry OP but your photos are not good. Lights on in every room just makes me think it's a really dark house.

That said, you've had two offers! So don't be downhearted.

Yes, you can't have your first pic with cones in and what looks like a social club.

OP I think the layout and property itself are fine. Layout is a personal thing really and many would be fine with a through lounge to the kitchen etc. Decor is a non issue as a buyer will redecorate to their taste so I wouldn’t waste money repainting anything. But the pictures need a revamp. Lights on in every room when it’s daylight outside suggests a naturally dark house. Those cones do need to be cropped out of the first picture. My eye was immediately drawn to them and I cannot work out what is going on there.

I’m afraid I’d also never buy a house marketed by Strike or Purple Bricks but this wouldn’t be an issue for a lot of buyers.

Agree it's the cricket club and the living room that are putting people off. And the fact there is downturn in the area at the moment.

As PPs have said:
Crop the first pic, get the cricket club and the cones out of the picture. It looks like people park up the side of your house (they probably do, but don't advertise it in your pictures)
Make more of the living room. Move the sofa from the conservatory against the back wall and take photos with a three piece suite in it. I'd ditch the big coffee table too for the photos.

Paint the green on the wall in the conservatory and put armchairs in there for photos. Make a cosy coffee nook. Cover them in rugs or whatever so they aren't obviously the same chairs moved from
Living room. Move the heater out of the photos as it tells buyers it gets cold in there!!

Again, fewer pics of the same things. Only one of utility. I got confused and thought it was the kitchen and I didn't like the curtain thing. Only pic with it in should show the kitchen

Lastly, the pic of Pendle hill came up at much lower resolution on my phone so it looks like it's been zoomed in massively. I realise that's because it is in portrait mode and so it is more enlarged to fit the screen. In fact I could only see pendle hill initially and not the front of your drive so it felt like a random add on. Make sure that you use one in landscape mode to avoid this happening to buyers

I agree, photos aren't doing it justice. Great advice above.

I walked round with the (bloody excellent) photographer who was taking photos of mine, and saw the lengths he went to to make the photos really sell.

The photos are so important - takes time and effort bit definitely worth doing well.

Only criticism is there appears to be no pictures of your garden?

Agree with the others: it’s the combination of downstairs layout where everything is a thoroughfare to everything else, together with the location on map being so close to the A road and roundabout, plus there’s no street view for reassurance.

Unfortunately you can’t fix those things and all the titivating with fruit bowls and moving sofas in the world won’t change a bad layout and location – all you can do is cut the price.

As others have said I would retake the first photo - it needs to be directly facing the house rather than at an angle.

More generally if you have any scope I would try and put a barrier up to differentiate between your garden and the cricket club - I would be out off thinking that the front garden goes straight into a car park. Can you put a fence, potted shrubs, stones or something to create a definite divide?

I would also be put off by strike - the branding seems very prominent on the page stressing how its free for the seller. My response as a buyer would be OK its free for the seller so whats the advantage to me? I would expect a reduction in price as a result of the free service. Is there another online estate agent you can go with that is better than strike?

"I would be out off thinking that the front garden goes straight into a car park."

It should be I would be put off not out off!

Looking further at strike it seems to be very much aimed at sellers - there seems to be nothing for the buyers. Purple bricks etc appear far more friendly.

First picture, I can see that building on the left and it says '...CLUB' Before I read the description it's next to cricket club I'm worrying about parking, the noise etc. That picture needs to be taken square on without the club in the background.
I'd re-do photos on a sunny day, the garden is not shown, the conservatory looks miserable and cold with that electric fire there.

Yeah, I'd be put off by the club and the living room is a bit odd. Is there no TV downstairs? I find it odd that the armchairs are pointing toward the door rather than the fire. I also agree you need some proper back garden pictures.

Pictures from previous sale are much better!

www.rightmove.co.uk/house-prices/detailMatching.html?prop=86992697&sale=90933975&country=england

Agree the previous pictures make it more appealing. But the last sale being in March 2020 would be another alarm bell - that OP has only lived there barely a couple of years before selling again (for 50k more!). Makes me feel the club and road are issues, or that there are other issues less obvious.

I wouldn’t be bothered about the previous sale – plenty of people have rethought where they’re living due to the pandemic so while at other times selling after two years is a red flag, selling after these particular two years isn’t: everyone’s lives and circumstances have changed and this house may no longer be right for them purely for post-pandemic lifestyle reasons, rather than anything bad.

Living room needs a sofa - should seat enough people / bedrooms

Conservatory - sofa doesn’t face the garden and looks unloved and unused - suggests it’s cold.

No garden pictures - why not?

Going through living room to kitchen would also put me off - is the back door acceptable to the drive/to get shopping in?

Also agree that the previous pictures are much better. I'd still have an issue with the layout, but at least you can see that the lounge is a perfectly usable room rather than a corridor.

Has the market really risen enough to justify 50K more? I appreciate there has been some decorating, but to me that doesn't add value as it's personal taste and I'd want to change it anyway, and the bathrooms/kitchen are 2 years older, which takes value off...

Never heard of Strike, but I've tried to buy through online agent and it was a nightmare so it would turn me off looking at houses listed with them.
You're too close to that motorway for me.

Online agent isn’t going to help and get some potted greenery outside your front door with a lovely outside door mat like this....

www.dunelm.com/product/scroll-half-moon-rubber-doormat-1000117322

Get rid of the garish coloured towels on bathroom, you wouldn't believe how much little things make a difference.

Agree about the pictures and put the big sofa in the living room.