Advice on RightMove ad

[Ham94]

We’ve just put our 2-bed property on the market but we’re not getting much interest. We know it’s a unique property so might take some time, but would love feedback & suggestions on our ad please: www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/153280712

Hi all, thanks for the comments!
to address some questions:

• yes, bedroom 2 has a skylight
• we can’t have it as a bedroom because we need two office spaces as we both work remotely
• the TV doesn’t come with the house lol

We’re not desperate to move right now, so will keep green walls, TV, dining table etc that we chose for our lifestyle and taste. But helpful to consider in a year or two if we don’t sell this time around!

Oh price increase is because we got new decking & turf, a new bathroom, new flooring throughout, redecorated throughout.
EAs all valued at £575k which I definitely agree is too much! So we reduced to be more in line with the market

I think that your decor is lovely OP. And I didn't even notice the TV - a large TV is hardly unusual.

I agree with comments about showing people that the second bedroom actually is a bedroom.

The things I would question as a buyer are what does a 'share of the freehold' mean ? Is the on-street parking easy / a nightmare? And is the price fair for the area?

I love the bathroom, the only thing that puts me off is the price!!! Definitely love it 🤩

I love the green walls in the living room and didn’t even notice the TV until PPs mentioned it. Bathroom is lovely too and the conifer 🎄
No advice but wish you look OP.

Share of freehold means there’s no lease ie we co-own the land with the owner of upstairs. We have a written agreement of who’s responsible for what. It’s standard for this kind of property, and the EA would explain for anyone who couldn’t work it out from google if they didn’t know that term

I see that you’ve just reduced the price so I expect you will get more interest now. At the end of the day, it’s lovely so the main reason for a lack of sale will be price.

Though I agree with the person who said you should have considered the Rightmove bands when reducing it & so reduced it down to 550k.

That’s good & should be a selling point.

I agree and I raised that with the EA, but they were adamant on £555k, so let’s see! We’ve only been up for 6 days, so hopefully it will pick it up with this price

They work for you not the other way round!

Ah well, hopefully it won’t make any difference. I must admit I always look at properties I can’t quite afford and then hope the sellers will negotiate.

Just not sure if other people are more disciplined.

Lots of people saying dress the house. Totally correct. I don't get people who won't make a change to their lives in the short term in order to sell. We removed half of our belongings and changed around 2 rooms. Sold in 4 days.

I do understand and think if we were desperate we would. But the cost of buying a bed to use for some photos to then be removed again would be a lot! We couldn’t maintain it for viewings because we have to work to pay the mortgage 😆

There should still be a lease. Unless I've got share of freehold wrong for the last 8 years!

It’s backed by a lease that has 990 years left, but that doesn’t cost anything to maintain. It’s called share of freehold

It looks like a super place and nicely presented. I'm sure it will sell easily if the price is realistic. Good luck!

Nice place but 550k for half a house would put me off

You can make one out of sturdy cardboard just for photos! Dress it as a bed, take pics then put the cardboard in the recycling bin!!

I own a flat on the same basis but the lease is still important and exists - I was confused when you said there was no lease.

Personally I think your flat is lovely. I don't know the area that well but I am in the process of selling my own flat in SE London and the market is definitely odd. We had lots of viewings and a couple of low offers and then viewing numbers declined but we got 3 offers in a week - 2 of which were full asking. It could just be time but I'd also be a bit put off by the increase in price over 2 years. We are zone 2 and prices haven't increased in value that much here.

Can you get Guide Price removed from the listing. I never bother looking at houses that say Guide Price as they tend to be being sold by auction or modern auction which I don't want to have to deal with.

I would tidy the garden, get rid of the conifer, trim the hedge and sweep the pavement at the front and rake up all of the leaves in the back garden.

Advertise it as a one bedroom and the second bedroom as a study.

Are people saying advertise it as a one bedroom used to London? City living usually means smaller spaces. I think it is very well presented and a couple of inoffensive wall colours are unlikely to put people off.

My issue is that the conversation hasn't made particularly good use of space. If there was a bigger bedroom to the front, then a smaller bedroom with corridor to allow access to bigger bedroom, you could open up the whole of the back as a living space. It would mean the massive hall can be used as living space and open direct to the garden. So then I got over invested and drew a diagram! It's just that doing that now would cost.

Is a skylight even allowed to be a bedroom?

its surely not a suitable fire escape.

I agree that the conversion has been a bit odd - such a long corridor - I would have done it as @SprigatitoYouAndIKnow suggested. Have checked it out on streetview and seen that you're next door to a school, so no parking outside I guess?
I definitely think you should dress the place too, I like to see where I'm going to eat, sleep, wash and relax, and I'd also like to see a bed in the spare room. Also the photos are a bit arbitrary, I'd try to get them retaken without such obvious screens. Like @tpmumtobe I can't unsee them!

I don’t think you need to do anything different in terms of decor, rearranging rooms etc. My DC is looking now in west London as a FTB and they would definitely see beyond anything that wasn’t to their taste. Also, they ideally want a bed 2 to wfh comfortably so again they’d look past anything.

The issue for them would be price. Their budget as a couple is £500k max and they wouldn’t be able to stretch, much as the garden and second bedroom would be a dream for them.

I’m wondering who your target market is OP - presuming maybe second time buyers?