How do I sell my house to a charity for a slight reduction?

[Sudeko]

I am not on the market yet but I am wondering more and more about whether this is a possibility. Our house is simply stated, unaffordable to most London/S.E buyers and huge in a desirable area etc. I would like to sell it to a DV or refugee charity as it would be great to split it into several units for ten or fifteen people (I don't know how it works but i think they need facilities on each floor). I would be happy to knock off a few £100k to help towards converting it.

I am finding it impossible to source information about how to make this happen. I know that some charities are left houses by people in their wills but if you are not at that stage of life and just want to give back to people of your choice rather than selling to a hedge fund manager or wealthy foreign investor who will probably never live there, then where do I start?

Speaking as someone who used to procure property for a charity (but not in your area), I think the issue may be that the charities may not have the capital to be able to purchase, even at a reduced price. Would you be in a situation to consider renting it to them? The charities will receive Housing Benefit which can be set against rental, but to raise many hundreds of thousands upfront to purchase might be prohibitive.

You'd also be asking the charity to take a huge risk that they'd get planning permission to convert to an HMO. And then even if they did have the initial purchase money, got planning, they'd still need to spend £££ converting.

Thanks. that is useful. I would need a lump sum to buy a smaller property in a nice area so probably not. I was wondering whether the larger charities work with particular developers whom I could approach instead?

I suppose I could apply to convert it myself. There are not really any neighbours directly affected but it is not beyond the realms of possibility that somebody several meters away could put in an objection.

Yes that doesn’t sound easy. Charities are disinvesting in property at the moment as it’s so £££ to run and maintain. Most refuges are rented or done through asset transfer/ some sort of arrangement with local authorities.
It’s a lovely thought though. I think from a charitable pov sell for the market price and donate the difference to the charity of your choice. Potentially tax efficient too. I get that doesn’t solve the community problem.

I think it's a lovely idea but not likely to fly.

The charities will have lots of factors affecting where they want to create their shelters/supportive units and your particular property may not be what they want. Also, kindly, you may be overestimating the value of your house. Saying that the house is "out of the budget of" most people who might want to buy it may just mean it is over-priced because the real value of any asset is the amount that a willing buyer is willing to pay.

By all means do contact local charities if you feel your house is particularly suited to being converted to an HMO - as PP say it would be sensible to apply for the appropriate permissions yourself to reduce the risk. You could let them know that you will be willing to take a fair but low offer from a charity in preference to a higher offer from a commercial buyer, and that you are willing to wait for a round of applications to appropriate funding sources (e.g. they may be able to apply for National Lottery funding or other large grants) to facilitate the purchase.

However it may be that it's not the right choice for them, in which case selling for the actual best price you can get on the open market and then donating 10% of that sum to a charity so that they can purchase a property that better suits their needs could turn out to be the better approach.

Yes, good points. I have never been on the market so I can only go by the typical buyer for my kind of property in my postcode. I don't particularly want to stage a house for sale. I thought this would fulfil many of my objectives all at once but maybe it's back to the drawing board.

You would be better off selling to the hedge fund bloke and donating the money you don’t need to the charity of your choice- much more useful for the charity to be able to apply funds to something specific and needed in the shorter term. If it’s a big donation you may get some say in its destination.

It would be a bit stressful to stage the house for viewing for that kind of buyer. I just want a wave-a-magic-wand sale without any hard work as I know that both new and old fixtures will be promptly ripped out upon completion. I may try one of those companies that buy immediately at a discount as long as it is not a massive discount because I still need to buy myself a home and donate a significant amount to charity. Are they any good?

What you are suggesting is not a sale without hard work you would be making a lot of work for yourself. Best bet is price to sell a developer with snap it up and convert it themselves.

Thoroughly declutter and clean and then list it with a traditional agent to sell in the normal manner. If it’s a solid property in a desirable area and you aren’t wanting to achieve top dollar then you don’t need to stage it or replace any fittings. Get some agents to value and tell them you want it priced to sell.

As a former housing association finance bod, my two cents is that even among associations and charities who do buy property to house their client group rather than lease it, there’s little appetite to convert large houses, which are often awkwardly laid out and, particularly if period, energy inefficient. New builds and purpose-built flats are far preferred.

You don't need to stage a property to sell it. Take a look on Rightmove, there are properties listed there where the sellers didn't even make the beds before having the photos taken!

Or loads of "in need of complete modernisation" probate sales.

Yea, staging will likely get you a better price or a quicker sale, but you don't seem worried about those.

Try Savills. They do residential development deals with the third sector. Ring hq at Margaret st.

Thanks, I'll definitely try Savills. I don't want to bother with doing anything to the house. I don't want to entertain picky buyers on multiple occasions. I have done it in the past but it does not appeal to me anymore. I would pay for an uneventful sale. Some of the pictures on Rightmove are shocking. I would be mortified to have any of my private space shown online even though it is just bog standard decor.

sell it at market price and donate some?

be much easier!

Can you achieve full market price with kids toys , huge models taking up half a room and giant artwork tacked everywhere. I mean wall art sized artwork and full cardboard cities which even prevent me from opening the curtains! In terms of decluttering it is all absolutely out of bounds. It would be seen as an attack on their creativity.

Market price is just what people will pay. It will put some buyers off if the house looks cluttered and dingy because of cardboard and junk everywhere, yes. Others will be able to look past it because they know it will be gone when they move in and will happily pay you a little under what market value would be for an immaculate property.

If you want to move out then you’re going to have to get rid of all this stuff anyway, so why not start now. How old are the DC? If you really can’t open curtains or see floor space etc then you need to come down hard and tell them to pick two or three of to wait favourite items to keep but the rest needs to go. Hire a small storage unit or find a friend with space in their garage and declutter anything valuable to there for the house sale.

Try Savills and also search for London property buying agents. A kind of reverse estate agent, who gets paid by the purchaser who engages them to search for the kind of property they want. That way you don't actively advertise to the open market.

If you want to move out though as Comtesse says, you are going to have to shift stuff.

Could you manage to pay a few months rental on some space somewhere that could be a temporary art studio and storage for this amazing creative output? There's an area near us that was built up to be various business premises with small warehouses, workshops and offices but half the units are unused as the kinds of businesses that used to rent there will now either be big enough to consolidate into a larger premises out on the rung road or will be small enough that everyone works from home. So there's various unlikely replacement tenants including one being a yoga studio, and another being a creative coworker space. Look around near you for a similar kind of run-down and semi-abandoned light industrial area, there might well be an appropriate space to rent.

I suspect that if you can rent such a space and declutter the whole house into it and present a lifestyle-magazine-perfect residence to the market, the difference in sale price you achieve will be more than what you pay in rent. Not because the property is actually more valuable in a decluttered state but without the clutter you will have more interest, offers will come in quicker (estate agents will always pressure you to drop the asking price by at least 5% if you don't get an offer in the first couple of weeks) and you may even get more than one offer in competition.

If you can't move the artwork to de clutter for a sale how are you going to manage the move?

Forgive me for saying this but you sound a bit naive. It is unlikely to be the the right size or location for a refuge, the hassle of converting etc. the charity would be far better off with the money.

I knew someone who left her big old house to the nhs in her will. She had an idea it could be used as a hospital. It wasn’t suitable and the house sat empty deteriorating until the NHS eventually sold it to just the kind of person she wanted to avoid selling it too but for a lot less that it would have been worth.

If you have a big house some distance away from neighbours how close is it to public transport? Those living in refuges need to be able to get to work and take their children to school.

Goodness what a lot of hand wringing for nothing. Even 20 million quid properties sell in London. And if you’re only knocking off 100 k it’s not in that bracket.

just habe it valued put it on the market at a low price and it will shift fast

There is a reason why charities don’t buy in expensive areas and in fact, will often aim to sell property they have in those areas (if you see properties they own in expensive areas, it’s usually because they’ve been left them). It’s because it’s not a good or effective use of charitable funds and not good governance. Why would I buy a property in Kensington for £4m when I could get the same size in say Acton for £1m?

Secondly, it is extremely difficult to get planning permission to turn a single dwelling into an HMO. Despite you having lovely ideas of it being a DV shelter, neighbours will lobby hard against this designation. They will see it as attracting trouble and temporary residents. I’ve had this experience when trying to get planning permission for children’s homes. Impossible.

If a dv charity is in the market for a property for conversion they will approach agents, it's not a regular occurrence though and local people may object to it being an hmo. Don't worry about staging it, any buyer can see through such things