Anyone else putting their home on the market in early 2025?

[newhomein2025]

Just that really - I'm going to be putting my home on the market soon, and hoping to find something to buy too. It's due to divorce, but I'm actually feeling ready to move on and find a wee place just for me and my teenager. I'm slightly dreading the process, and all the associated hassle, and worried that I won't be able to find somewhere I can afford nearby, but excited to start again. Anyone else planning on selling and buying in 2025 and want to keep me company?

@OtiMama We only view properties on a Saturday as we work full time in the week - and I'm sure lots of people will be the same, so I would think that's fine for most people,

We saw a property last week, and have booked a second viewing - but there has now been an offer made on it (they are still letting us view it) .... but I had my hopes up - and now feel quite sad that we probably wont get it :-(

Its very hard not to get emotionally invested - I could imagine us living there ..

Ah it's so hard not to act like it's yours @BunnyMum2000 but you never know, the fact they're bothering to let you look would suggest you have some chance!

We've got two viewings booked today for our house for 5.30pm next Thursday and a Saturday so that fits us well. He said they've had more interested to book a block on the Saturday, so that's promising as it's been up less than 24 hours...still nothing for us to view!

One seller has responded to the estate agent about our offer yesterday morning, the other one still hasn’t acknowledged it. Ahh this divorce is clearly going to be a nightmare!

Ours went back on the market yesterday afternoon but it's been crickets so far. It's not listed as newest because we've not changed the price (we'd already reduced by 25k) so it's annoyingly at least 15th on the list when you search the price bracket for this area 😒
We have given notice to change agents but we're going to have to wait 2 weeks before we can do that.

It looks like things are moving one way or another, but I am sorry to hear about the offers pulling out!
@BunnyWilliams changing agents might definitely help. We have just done so and now we are having a lot of interest from people that the new agent had in their pipeline. 1 viewing today which was positive and 2 more viewings lined up!

My buyer wants to come back for another viewing and measure things up - WTF! - bit early in the process unless their having second thoughts. I haven't even got an offer on a house yet as haven't found one. My brain is in melt down over the 32 pages of questions on the house that is needed pre contract!

Our buyers came back to measure up two days after we accepted their offer. They are apparently very excited. 6 weeks on we still haven’t found a property 😬

We’ve done the touch up jobs on the house that we were planning on doing and had our first 2 viewings this week. Just had confirmation that they have both booked a second viewing so hopefully that’s a good sign!

I'm having a wobble. Still want to move but I'm finding the process ridiculous. My buyer is having second look at my suggestion, survey is booked in too.
All it takes is someone to pull out though and it falls apart.
It doesn't help that we like the area generally but would like quiter garden and nothing much is available. Spoke to EA and we are looking at June earliest move.
MIL is going to have back surgery but it isn't looking great with her, so might need to pull out anyway.
Rant over.

I’m finding the whole house selling thing really stressful. I’m on my own (well, DD21 is moving with me) but it feels like everything is on my shoulders.

I’ve been on the market 6 weeks. 3 viewings then had an offer, they pulled out 8 days later. That was just over 2 weeks ago. 9 viewings since then, my EA is honestly fab and doing a great job getting people through the door.

No-one has criticised the house itself in terms of decor, doesn’t need work, etc. The feedback has been garden too small, downstairs too small (integral garage means upstairs is a good size with 3 proper doubles all with built in storage) but downstairs is proportionality smaller, don’t like the location. All things I can’t do anything about.

All 3 agents I had around valued it at exactly the same, so it’s not like I picked the biggest price. Looks right for others around. No one has quibbled about price (the offer I had was almost asking price).

Last weekend there were 2 viewings that apparently went well. In then turns out that one couple are serial viewers who then said they’re going to make an offer, but have blocked the agent, who has found out they’ve done the same all across town with all local EA! How do people have the time to go and view houses for kicks?! The other couple like mine most out of the 4 they’ve seen, but have 2 more viewings tomorrow.

I don’t have to move, I just want to downsize and relocate for a change of scenery post divorce. I keep telling myself it’s only been 6 weeks, there’s been plenty of viewings, I just need one (more) person to love it!

Glad to hear you like your EA - it's not that common 😀.

Why did your buyer pull out? I'd take the feedback from viewings with a pinch of salt. What you've said about garden and downstairs size, you can't do anything about. If that becomes a sticking point, you will need to drop the price to a price bracket where it doesn't seem small to the potential buyer.

Unfortunately, you will probably get a succession of time wasters. It's a buyers market in most locations so EAs will show anyone round regardless of proceedability.

Given you'd had an offer, you should probably stick it out a bit longer before dropping the price. I wouldn't wait too long though as you want to hit the spring market at exactly the right price point and you'll have increased competition. Just because your price is in line with others on the market doesn't mean it's right. The price that matters is the sold price so check what others in the area have sold for.

Good that you don't 'need' to move as that means you can hopefully avoid getting too emotionally invested at least for now.

Thanks @Gekko21

Genuinely, my EA has been great so far. I agreed to them bringing around non-proceedable buyers insofar as as long as they were at least on the market. So I’ve had a few of those, but mostly it’s been people in rented.

Buyer pulled out after going through the whole mortgage, deposit, ID and providing solicitors details - decided they didn’t like the town, despite them saying they wanted grammar schools, which is relevant here.

Garden - it’s not that small, but if you want veg beds and flower borders it’s possibly too small. It is south facing though and therefore lovely and sunny, and not overlooked at all.

My neighbour a couple of doors down with an identical layout house sold 6 months ago off a slightly lower asking price than mine. Mine was deemed ‘better’ by the agents as I have a bigger corner plot and a new kitchen / ensuite, and am away from the road. Mines on at £499k, they were £490k and got £483k. But yes, I may need to revisit price.

But then it’s only been 6 weeks as I keep telling myself, and people are clearly happy to come and view at the price it’s on at!

Tell your agent not to give you feedback unless it's something you can do about (repaint/open windows etc).
I tortured myself exactly with that kind of feedback in 2022/2023 when we sold twice before it all falling through.
It is honestly so much easier mentally not to hear it!
I also am very struct with the agent, told them very firmly that only people who are after this type of property should view. They have been very food so far, 4 viewings, sold twice.
It's still tough even after sold.
Because of the uncertainty I think.

@rhubarb007 it sounds like you just have so much going on in your life. Sorry it's so tough for you. The way it all works is so stressful isn't it. Everything is just a hope it's ok until it's all done!

6 weeks isn't that long @ScoobyDoesnt and you only need that one person to make the offer. Not being in a rush works in your favour. It's annoying that you have to wait for right move to update as our neighbour sold December but how much for isn't up yet for us to snoop on!

I just obsessively look every day and nothing is coming up we can even look at, seems to be loads on if you've got £650k plus and a fair bit around our current house price but not much in the price range we are looking at between or it's all the wrong side of town for us! Just hoping it's all coming in the next month. If we can sell and be ready for it to all come in next month that would be great 😂 😂 optimistic!

So I am doing 3 viewings tomorrow - the market I am in - anything that fits my criteria goes in less than a week. I have one strong favorite which I know I will need to place an offer on very quickly. Bit of an excel freak here but I ended up with a 'decision tree' on these properties - harps back to my project management days - unfortunately. Meanwhile my FTB is busy organising a valuation survey on the house - they are busy steaming ahead!

I'm so jealous of everyone with fast-moving markets and don't understand why things are so slow here. Still nothing new is coming on and most houses sit on the market for at least 3-6 months before selling. Some perfectly nice houses in the 600k+ bracket have been on for over a year.

We still haven't had any viewing requests for ours since it went back to market. It was like this list time - just one odd viewing every few weeks. It seems like a fluke that we even got a buyer!

That sounds tough @BunnyWilliams . We've been on 4 weeks and it already feels like an eternity. We had a flurry (well 5) viewings in the first 2 weeks and now nothing. One very low offer.

So, we've now had 2 EAs round to value and the estimates are about 10% apart. The one quoting the higher price also has higher fees, so not sure if it's just an enticement to sign us. But also worried that the other doesn't see the value in our place and will go for a quicker sale at a lower price.
We've also been trying to view a couple of properties. But, it's quite tricky getting weekend viewings. We're moving about 3 hours away, so viewings are tricky during the week. We've found a house we like and will view it this week - very oddly it's on Rightmove to rent, but with another EA for sale. I can't quite figure this out.

What would you say is a reasonable amount of time to respond to an offer? We accepted ours on the day, granted for over asking.
Offered 15k less on a 450k property that has been up for 6 months and since Wednesday morning we still haven’t had a response!
Surely at 6 months on the market they couldn’t have expected any higher. I thought we went in high too as we didn’t want to mess about with back and forth.

I wonder if they had a viewing booked for the weekend and wanted to see how that one went?

I would be phoning the EA on Monday to push for a reply.

A day. BUT people get busy so sometimes due to work people don't really get to speak to each other till weekend, so I would say Monday.

Yeah I would call Monday just for an update. I can only think they are waiting on any other viewings they have booked already.

There’s a house near me that’s been for sale for a long time. It’s empty, listed with two agents to sell and also listed with a different agent to rent. Basically keeping all options open, rent or buy, they just want something to happen.

Well did 3 viewings and placed an offer - but there is alot of interest so could end up as BAFO on Monday. But OMG one of the houses did'nt even have an oven in it and had all the pornographic artwork on the walls and the bathrooms and ensuite were just really unclean. The guy wants top dollar for it and IMHO it needs at least 50K+ spent on it. The pictures did'nt reflect the reality!. The other house - you could smell paint and it had this awful wood chip painted wallpaper which would be really nasty to remove. Really hope I don't end up in a bidding war on my preferred one!