About to put our house up for sale.. anyone else?

[DomusAurea]

We are taking the plunge and it's happening - we are selling our house (and relocating 200 miles away but that's another thread I guess) - anyone else? I could do with a collective handhold!

This is where we are now:

• finishing the last small jobs such as painting a ceiling
• having meets with estate agents for valuation
• nervously searching rightmove for possible houses in our relocation area (there isn't a lot!)

Are you going for sale soon? Tell me how it's going!

(we are in the South East)

@Foxglovesandlilacs86 Whoa, what a babe of a house! Did a proper “schawing!” at those photos. You’ll be snapped up. I’d bite your arm off if I had the budget for that.

@Foxglovesandlilacs86 wow! What a stunning house, I’m sure it will sell quickly!

Mine went up on Rightmove today (not brave enough to post a link) and have viewings booked for 6 and 9 April which seems quite a long way off.

I rang the local solicitor who did the conveyancing when I bought the house and he wouldn’t accept my instruction (with regret) 😔 because he already has 223 cases on the go! (Small local and lovely solicitor). I’m hoping this bodes well for a general upswing in market interest.

Ab-so-lute-ly luuuuuurrrrrrve your house @Foxglovesandlilacs86. I have major house envy! That would be my dream! What are you going to move to? It must be spectacular!

I've got a viewing on a house for me tomorrow, which has potential. It would need a garage conversion to make it big enough for our needs, but with an extra 10k in the budget, if I can get this for asking, then it is pretty ideal. The location is further than I'd like, but it is still doable to keep my children at the same school. Will need to look at high school options though 🤔.

Pleased to say we had 5 offers after our open day on Saturday. We have accepted an offer today. Hopefully "SOLD subject to contract" will be on the board tomorrow.
The buyers are a family with children, they have bought a lovely family home.

Repeating the thread mantra, Nerves of an elephant, skin of steel.

Sorry, should say "are buying" . We are not there yet, by any stretch.

I'm jelly inside @BeryltheMenaceneePeril! Trying to channel the mantra though!
Congrats on the offers! It's such a relief isn't it?!

@Twiglets1

Have you thought about lowering the price *@Doubleraspberry*? We had 30 viewings and only a couple of very low offers on our flat in London and had to lower the price by 10%. It wasn’t an easy sale as it hadn’t been decorated in about 15 plus years as my father used to live there. But the main problem was the price was too high.

We dropped the price by 50k after the first tranche of viewings, but that was soft marketed and always intended to see whether the initial valuation was right. The second set of viewers were all just adamant the house wouldn’t work for them - it wasn’t about the price. Not even low offers, just no. It’s already the cheapest four bed house of anywhere near its size in the area. Very happy to continue dropping if the feedback starts to be about the price and we’d definitely consider offers below asking. It’s only slightly more expensive than some local flats now!

Early good morning from me and Beryl: big congrats!!!! :) it's like an ultramarathon, this house buying thing, and you got to the first feeding station.

I feel like I have done the training (prepped the house for sale, done market research) and bought the kit including the shoes (chosen estate agent) and now I am travelling to the start, getting ready to stand on the start line with butterflies in my tummy. I am ready for this :)

...and of course we aren't yet on the market and saw on RM a house I absolutely love and would be perfect for us .... I must stop looking because there's no point now.

@Foxglovesandlilacs86 - best of luck!! Lovely house but how did you cope with cleaning 3 bathrooms? We are looking at house with 2, 2+1/2 max because I don't think we could cope with 3. (sorry digression).

@Doubleraspberry - I am sorry to hear, hope things resolve - testing the market can backfire sometimes :(

@ThisMustBeMyDream - best luck for the viewing - we want a full report after please :)

To all: if you are not up to posting full links (and I understand, I think I'll fear posting mine) maybe you can post pictures? I promise as soon as I have some from the photographer I'll post them.

Actually, as a preview - here's my cat feeling at home and shedding hair everywhere - it took me ages to clean that chair yesterday morning - the hairy monkey :)

OP I haven't read the whole thread but I know studies here in the USA showed that professional photos are essential for getting more serious buyers and the right offers. You don't have to create "unrealistic" photos, in fact good photos should give buyers and very realistic understanding of your home. But bad photos (especially badly lit) can prevent people from even coming to look, and bad photos can give the impression that your EA and you are amateurs. It can definitely lower the offers you get as less people will make the effort to see the house.

www.redfin.com/blog/professional-real-estate-photos-sell-homes-for-more/

www.redfin.com/blog/real-estate-tips-for-home-sellers/

@GoodnessTruthBeauty - thank you but of course we are having professional photo done here :) the snap of my cat is something I do and is definitely not used to sell the house lol

'the snap of my cat is something I do' that meant to say 'the snap of my cat is something I took' :)

Thats so funny as I didn't see your post with your cat!

@BeryltheMenaceneePeril Just out of interest how do you know they are a family? Did you do the viewings yourself? Our estate agent is doing ours but I'm nosy!

Morning all house sellers, update from me....EA photos done last Wednesday & we went live yesterday morning!......non stop messages from them yesterday & we have 16 viewings booked between this afternoon & Saturday 😱 & we still can’t see anything we like....the market around here (Cheshire) is bonkers....

1st viewing an hour after I finish work at lunchtime today so I’ll dash home run the hoover round & take myself out for lunch! 😂🤞

@DomusAurea good cat! I don’t think testing the market backfired. It means I don’t think we went on at a stupid price - our selling price is what some viewers said they thought roughly right. It backfired only in that we didn’t immediately sell, which is what has annoyed the agents!

@GoodnessTruthBeauty

Thats so funny as I didn't see your post with your cat!

Hahahaha because it came after the cat to it looked like you were saying 'OMG Domus don't put that shocker on RM' - I promise I won't

@Doubleraspberry, sorry did not mean to say your house was overpriced - let me give you some context: mine is, too, an unusual 4 beds. One agent proposed to 'test' the market with a price that he thought the house was worth it at the moment, whereas a second agent proposed to start lower at the same price another one sold 9 months ago (so something that can be checked on land registry) and inviting 'offers over' as the market has moved up since. This second agent told me that testing the market backfires because, as a test, is experimental and often people have to reduce on a house, which is ultimately conducive to lower prices. I decided to go with the second agent as it resonated with me.

There's a little blog about this, although I realise the situation is way more complex: www.trulia.com/blog/8-reasons-not-to-test-the-market-with-your-asking-price/

This was my reasoning, applied to our local market - I totally realise it may not apply to where you are and to your house. I am sorry, I should have given you some context of my throwaway comment.

@missmeg3leg - good luck!! Things looking very promising for you at the moment.

@DomusAurea I've got 8 children so 3 bathrooms is a must really, I honestly feel like I never stop cleaning, we used to have a cleaners but they never did things the way I liked them and had all sorts of problems with the last one so I gave up and now I do everything myself!

We've got 4 viewings lined up for next week, they're trying to get them all on the same day which will be easier for me.

I've not found anywhere yet! I'm looking for another fixer upper which is what this house was.

@DomusAurea hey, I didn't take it badly! We didn't 'test the market' in putting it on at a high price - it was marketed offline at one price to see whether we got offers or it needed to be reduced a bit. I was actively looking to avoid putting it on at a price that needed to be reduced quickly. So it's only ever been online at one price - and that price really is towards the bottom of the range for similar houses. The soft market price was the one that three agents valued it at, but I was always wary about, so reducing it before going online felt right to me.

@Doubleraspberry, beautiful, thank you for explaining - i am terrified about insulting people online as aware that written medium is conducive to all tory of misunderstanding - like the one about the pictures and the cat

@Foxglovesandlilacs86 - 8kids - you goddess - I struggle with 2 - totally get the need for the bathrooms :)