Will spring next year be a better time to sell our house?

[nellytheelephant1980]

We need to sell our house within the next 18 months.
The market is dead round here at the moment. Mixture of everything going on and then winter is quiet for the housing market anyway .

Is spring likely to be a better time to sell? Normally it is, but I'm a bit worried. Are we likely to see anymore stability next spring time for house sellers/movers?

Thanks

I must admit that would be my least preferred option we did that and the tenants in Omaha careful they are they always do something to your house which you’re emotionally attached to because it is your home and then you feel emotionally all at sea because you’re in a rental property in the new location. As long as you’re buying and selling the same market I don’t think it makes a lot of difference, IF your house has dropped well then so was everybody else’s and your purchase price will reflect what you’re able to accept for your house.

Just make sure you’re not the one to blink first so don’t you be accepting a low offer unless everybody else is.

Prices are going to come down (I think!). We were looking at borrowing at £550k which a couple of months ago was about £2.5k pcm. It’s now £3.6kpcm so our budget would be completely slashed.

If you’re upsizing and have good equity I’d wait.

Usually does pick up in spring - I would list in late Feb or early March personally if I was putting mine on market soon , people have it in their head they want to move by Christmas which is too late now , then January start to think about looking

For me, I think if 18 months is your cut off, I'd put it on the market as soon as possible. I don't think anyone knows what is happening in the next 6 months, but I do know a few people who are buying/selling right now, and negotiating + completing seems to be taking them a really long time.

If you wait until March and it takes a year to sell, you're a bit stuck, right?

It's different if your focus is on getting the absolute best price possible, and you can wait things out.

The busiest day of the year on Right Move is Boxing Day. We're just entering into a really dead part of the year but after Christmas, it picks up a bit. DM had her house on the market from around July and couldn't sell it. She took it off again at the start of December, switched estate agent and he relaunched it on Boxing Day. She sold on 4th January only a couple of thousand below her (fairly ambitious) full asking price. Her property was a weird layout which wouldn't appeal to many so to suddenly shift like that was impressive.

We need to get to market urgently but the house is a bomb site and not fit to sell yet. We need to paint a few rooms and have an enormous declutter. The trouble is we both WFH full time and I home educate two SEN DC full time, plus I'm supporting a disabled DM. I am making slow progress as I just don't have the time and with everyone else cluttering behind me again as I tidy/declutter, it's like two steps forward one step back!!!

We sold our house late Nov/ early Dec.

If you are moving to a cheaper area and will have a lower budget there, I would say to market the house now rather than delaying. House prices are expected to fall so you would probably lose less money in real terms if you sell sooner.

I’d get on and sell - the market’s changed and I don’t think it’s just seasonal.

We viewed and offered in spring and are looking again now, gone are the days of queueing down the street for open houses, offering 10-20% over asking and things selling in days. Now it’s reductions, viewings whenever and lots of the properties from Spring coming back on the market.

With the cost of living I can’t see it improving soon. It’s going to be an expensive winter and with much higher mortgage rates some people will need to sell but with less people able to buy. Maybe there won’t be a huge crash like the doom sayers claim but it’s not going to be a big year for growth.