Does changing agent when you’re selling make any difference?

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As the title says really. In the age of RightMove, Prime Location etc, what difference does one agent make over another really? For a mainstream house rather than castles or £££ mansions or anything specialist, and not eg Purple Bricks type places.

My house is on the market, very little interest so far. I’ll drop the price in due course as that’s probably the main issue but friends keep asking if I’ll change agents.

My agents are fine, they have done a great job with photos, brochure etc so presumably I’d have to get all those redone if I swapped. The person I have contact with there is a bit lacklustre admittedly.

But surely buyers don’t just register with one or two agents and hope those agents have the right property for them, they look at portals and then contact agents holding properties of interest?

Yes they can. The way they market the house, show people around and point out the positives, chase potential buyers to get feedback, make sure both parties are hurried along in the sales process to keep things moving. A lot of things you don't see on Rightmove which isn't everything.

What they can't do is miraculously make your 300K run down pit be worth 450K.

There is only so much current they can swim against.

The Estate Agents job is to actually sell the house.
Pick the phone up and call people who have registered with you as an agent and tell them about properties that have come onto the market in order to achieve the best price possible for the person they are working for the vendor i.e. you

I’ve been looking for a property in a particular area and I 100% know which is Estate Agent. I would use if I was ever selling my house.
They are head and shoulders above everybody else, Proactive helpful they know the properties I’ve asked to view houses and they’ve said no that’s not the one for you because of XYNZ

Well when the prospective purchaser calls up for a viewing and your "lacklustre" agent cant be arsed to book in a viewing or the purchaser gets the impression that they are not that bothered, they move on to the next property. You need a decent price and a proactive agent who actually wants to sell your property and not do a shit job.

Ok so let’s say I’m being unfair about my lacklustre contact. They have absolutely rung people, got feedback, chased etc. I might not gel with them personally. The valuations person was good and the agents have a good rep at getting the process through (different person to the house-viewing / calling person manages this), my neighbour sold through them last year and rated them.

If I swap agents are they likely to have access to a whole new pool of buyers who have never looked on the portals? Just want to work out how long I give current agents once I drop the price and gird my loins for setting the house up for photos again.

I've only had a phone call 'would you like to look at this house?' once in over three years of househunting.

Their own mailing lists - well, they used to seem to exist a few years ago, but hardly any of them do it anymore. They all rely on Rightmove. NB: I'm in an area where houses sell pretty quickly, albeit there aren't bidding wars atm.

I actively avoid trying to buy a house through the biggest agent in my area because my previous experience of getting appointments through them has been an ongoing ball ache and I hate to think what their sales progression team is like. The agent who's showed us several houses turns up smelling like he's just fallen out of a speakeasy and in the less desirable properties that he clearly doesn't like, can't seem to bring himself to point out the positive attributes of the house. If he doesn't like it, he just stays silent and lets us walk around on our own. That's not a bad thing btw, us and this agent have the same taste in houses, it's just that he could've possibly sold us a house a year ago if he'd talked it up.

When I come to eventually buy a house and one day I will need to sell it, I'll remember exactly what the buyer experience is like through this agent and I will not use them. I have a very long memory for being pissed off.

They recently sold a house without booking us the viewing I asked for. Suddenly it went sold stc after 5 weeks; no idea what that was about. Turned out it was listed and we wouldn't have bought anyway, but our budget is considerably higher than the asking price and we're FTB, in a rental, out of contract, so they absolutely should have made sure we saw it.

Agents matter.

Get a friend to do a mystery shop/viewing and see what it's like getting an appointment/what the agent is saying about your house/your willingness to accept offers etc in person.

It can sometimes make a difference if they market your house better, are proactive in chasing buyers and progressing sales. However, you do say that your current agents have done a great job wrt the photos and brochure so it's hard to sell. Generally, if a house isn't getting much or any interest, the problem is the price. Have you checked what is going on with the housing market in your area for similar properties? Is anything selling and, if so, what and for what price? You need to make your listing more attractive than the others and that definitely includes price as well as the way it is marketed.

It’s definitely price at the moment and inwilll be dropping but personal circs right now mean I can’t do so for a couple of weeks.

A good agent helps you to seal the deal.

No viewings only means combination of mispriced and unappealing property.

yes so what I’m asking is - if we were getting viewings but agent not able to push through to sale then it would be worth changing agents?

But few / no viewings = not worth changing as likely to be price (I know this!) rather than one agent mysteriously better than another at magicking up prospective viewers?

Given that anyone can see the property on a portal and register interest, so as long as the agent is on the portals and has done a decent job of photos and blurb, there can’t be much difference between agents at this stage other than some buyers’ personal preferences from past experience.

How long have you been on the market? If you’re going to drop the price significantly I would look at potentially changing the agent. Especially if you are saying your contact there is lacklustre. I would absolutely get your friend to call your current agent first though with some “enquiries” about your property and potential viewing times to see how they fare. This may make your mind up for you!

We had three agents. No viewings from the first. Viewings and offers from the second, but someone lied about the position of the buyers and it turned out they weren’t proceedable. Viewings from the third and an offer after three days that went to completion.

So yes, agents do matter. Of course, you’ll be happy with the one that pushed the sale through, but you aren’t going to know that from the start.

Made a difference to me in that the house actually got sold

I’ve viewed properties I was quite interested in, it the agent never bothered calling for feedback/to book a second viewing, and in the meantime I found other properties to look at. Some agents are just shite.

A good agent will give you proper advice on pricing and will work to maximise interest. If you’ve had lacklustre interest with your current agent then you’ve already had bad advice (or not taken the good advice) and have prejudiced your interests because a property hanging around on Rightmove goes stale pretty quickly.

When we were looking this house was on with two agents. It was, to be fair, something very few people would love. I contacted all the EAs in the area to describe what we wanted as we were moving from out of area. This house matched the criteria exactly, even down to the requires work, but only one of them suggested it.

Our neighbour has just changed EAs, her first described the house so poorly i'm not surprised she didn't have many viewings - read like it was written by a 12 year old. New EAs have got her twice as many viewings in 2 weeks as the last did in a year, with no change in price and listing on fewer portals.

When we sold our last house our EAs arranged back to back open day viewings and got us multiple offers on the day. Then did it again when the buyers pulled out. They worked their contact books really hard, second time it wasn't even listed and the day was booked up! They also advised us really well on who was proceedable when it went to bids.

Definitely makes a difference imho.