Why isn’t my house selling

[18Willow]

Hi my house is a bit unusual but we’re not getting a lot of interest, I’d be grateful if you could look at the link and advise on any improvements. Please note the outside wall has been painted since the photo was taken and a new photo will be done this week. The price is spot on for the area too. Thanks https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/150644813#/?channel=RES_BUY

Too much space- looks like it would not be cosy in the winter and cost a fortune to heat.

Move your living room furniture away from the walls- at the moment the coffee table is so far away from the sofas that you’d have to get up and walk to it every time you put your cup down.

The photo of the lovely modern bathroom with the black shower enclosure is spoiled by all the shampoo and shower gel bottles hanging in the basket, you should have moved those out of sight for the picture. Unfortunately that bathroom is so nice that the old-fashioned state of the others comes as quite a disappointment.

As someone else said, too many bathrooms to clean.

Far too much orange wood everywhere. I’d be pricing up the huge cost and effort of painting it all.

“Formally a B&B”- with agents that bad at spelling/written English I’d be questioning their competence generally.

I’d also be wondering why you clearly got fed up renovating and decided to move on.

Did you ever run it as a B&B OP? If yes, will you be prepared to talk to potential buyers about running it as one again?

Is there a pic of what is inside that garden room? Normally they are nice to have but with the size of the house and annexe it just seems unnecessary.

Sorry to focus on negatives, lots of lovely features too. the condition of your lawn is fabulous!

The quality of the photos aren’t great. I’d get a better estate agent (like savills or similar). That in itself might get you seen by a wider and more appropriate market. You get what you pay for with these things. They’ll also be able to advise on what to do to

it’s a bit of a tricky one because the kitchen and living room are lovely but the bedrooms and halls are dated. dark wood might put people off. So it needs a lot of work to update but seems in decent nick and is expensive for the area.

I think the wall is pretty high, it looks above head height to me.

Bedroom 7 was clearly inspired by Harry Potter's cupboard bedroom.

Could be useful for a little loved relation I suppose, it's impossible to fall in that space because there's nowhere to go!

I suppose the tricky thing is : who is this house for?

Young family - no
Older relatives - no
Large family - perhaps
Middle aged who work from home and have teenage kids - would the local area work for teens - perhaps
Possible live in business - perhaps but given it's previous history is suggests it failed before in this niche

The door closers and the fire alarm points make it look like a HMO/ B&B.

I’ve just realised that “Reception” doesn’t mean a living area, it means an actual Reception, for checking in.

It’s basically still a commercial building. The blurb of “Formally a B&B” is actually much more accurate than the “formerly” that they meant to say. It’s a bit disingenuous to say it is a family home when it is actually a B&B with potential for conversion to a large family home.

The photos are all over the place, sort them into floors. Too many photos. There is no cohesion in the house and in my personal opinion the kitchen is bland and doesn’t flow.

It’s beautiful from the outside but feels like a lot of period features have gone.

Great looking from the outside and huge rooms are a plus.

Looks and feels like a B&B more than a family home and the note in the description doesn't help.

Most people looking to buy a family home do it when their kids are small and if with young kids I'd want more than two bedrooms on the first floor. As others have said, it would much better as a 4 bed with annex than being marketed as 7 bed.

The road and car park would both push the price down for me, but not everyone is bothers about those things.

It's a lovely house and a perfect distance away from a train station! What I would say is, it's very niche (I have a family of 4 in a 5 bedroom house, much smaller than yours, and sometimes it seems too big for us) because not many families can fill those bedrooms. Then you have Council Tax band F, which must be a mint each month. We are E and that's expensive. Then, recently we've had solar panels fitted and a heat air pump. Our bills got way too high with current prices. I didn't look into detail - but I'd say if you are traditionally gas fired or an oil tank property, this is an exceptionally expensive property each month. I think it's almost better to sell it to developers so they can divide it into two. Personally I think changing any decor is a waste of money. It's the actual infrastructure of running the house you need to look at. Most people just don't have that disposable income to spend on gas and electric bills.

Firstly it's a lovely house but not many people want that many bedrooms so it could be deterring interest. Could you market it as 4 bedrooms with a guest suite?

The lights are on in the photos of the kitchen which screams that it's a dark cave. Or really bad photographer.

The fridge freezer is in the middle of the room. Not sure why it’s not up against the wall then you could have a beautiful sideboard near the dining table. But ultimately it’s too expensive for the local market and needs a lot spending on it.

I’ve read this about 4 times and looked at the photos and I still can’t understand what you mean! The back of the fridge freezer is touching the wall?

What a beautiful house - I would buy it in a heartbeat if it was where I am in south England (where it would be worth well over a million and probably 1.3). Nothing wrong with it at all, must be the ‘funny market’. Lots of erroneous results happening with it at the moment.

For the record that’s not me saying I could afford a million pound house, I could stretch to OP’s asking price though

It's quite soulless, clearly a b&b? Not a home.

Honestly? I look at it and think what a lot of work it would need.

Lots of the walls in various rooms e.g. hallway, bathroom and bedroom are far too ‘busy’ and are huge turn off. I would want them painted neutrally before I moved in.
The carpets in the bedrooms look like they need replacing, that’s a huge expensive.

Those are the newly-decorated rooms! Busy dark-coloured wallpaper is very fashionable, it’s called maximalism. I love it (especially the bathroom) and think the other rooms look so bland by comparison.

I think when you compare it to this house it seems overpriced: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/151592993#/floorplan?activePlan=2&channel=RES_BUY

This house is probably smaller square footage wise but is does have 4 bedrooms + 2 box rooms, 2 reception rooms, lovely garden and it doesn't need anything doing to it.

It's also in the same exact area.

Oh really? 😯😂

It’s interesting to hear what’s ‘in’ and classed as fashionable these days!

Size of house to heat it all.
It doesn't open up at the back to a garden.
It's by a road. The annexe would maybe suit a granny. But it's more like a b&b.

It's beautiful outside. But inside not a family home really. The kitchen is gorgeous. Needs better photos

Genuinely I think the market is slowing. We live outside Aviemore and looking at RightMove yesterday there are lots of properties in the village which have been in the market for over 6 months, it's been years since it was like this - properties usually fly! I don't think people are willing to take risks at the mo and as others have said its a limited market for such a big house. Not sure if it's a local issue or nationwide.

Lovely house btw

Agree, this is lovely.

Another thread making me feel like moving away from the SE of England is the way to go!

what's it like living in Elgin?