Viewings - people not on the market

[Delatron]

Do you accept viewings from people who are not even on the market yet? We have had so many viewings on our house and I’m completely exhausted by the whole thing. At least 75% don’t even have their house on the market. It just seems pointless.

Is it ok to say viewings only from people who at least have their house on the market or don’t need to sell.

I wouldn’t be restricting the viewings to ‘proceedable’ people only, especially after being on the market for more than 6 months.

People can and do market and sell houses quickly after finding a suitable onward purchase.

Just because you’ve had an offer on a property, you’re not necessarily going to be able to proceed very quickly - we pulled out of an offer we made on a property when we found out there were 16 transactions in the chain! 😱

We are also not needing to sell this property to buy our next house. So won’t be in a chain above us.

We are averaging about a viewing a week. Unless they are back to back viewings I can’t cope with any more than that. So will tack on non proceedable to those in a better position.

I am just not prepared to spend hours getting the house ready for people who haven’t even got their house on the market. In this market it doesn’t seem like anything is moving quickly.

If you don’t need to sell your property, why don’t you proceed with your onward purchase and leave your current house empty / minimally furnished, to save the hassle of tidying for viewings.

Thanks @Butterflyfluff we are trying to decide what to do. Without wanting to sound like an idiot. We saw a house we loved and bought it as we were lucky enough to be able to without selling this one. It’s a downsize for us as kids leaving in the next few years.

So that has all gone through adn we own the property. We hoped to sell this one reasonably quickly. We have been renting the other house out sporadically but that is stressful. I’m going to give it until June when DS2 has finished exams and if this house hasn't sold by then I’m trying to convince DH it’s better to live in the new house and get this one styled and looking amazing. Then no stress on getting ready for viewings but obviously costs to that are large!!

Also as I’m the one doing all the work getting the house ready he doesn’t really understand the impact it is having on me. (Despite me telling him!).

It depends . We have viewed houses before putting our house on the market because we knew our house would sell quickly and we wanted to make sure we could find something we liked before putting our house up for sale.
If their are enough people wanting to view who have already sold or close to selling them I can understand why you would want to limit viewers. But if not you might miss a sale by limiting viewers .it depends on the market where you are.

The thing is what’s the motivating factor. People move houses by push or pull. Either something about the current home is pushing them out so they need extra bedrooms for example. Or something is pulling them to a new house. So they don’t need to move but they see something they love and make the decision to move. Just because someone has their house on the market or even an offer doesn’t mean they’re proceedable. Many a slip…. You could have an open day and then only accept second viewings from ‘proceedable’ viewers. If someone sees your house and loves it, your EA should be working their ass off to get them listing with them and pushing their house in the sales market.

@Delatron Capital gains tax. Be very careful!

I think capital gains tax is owed when you sell a home that is not your primary residence. I know we have a deadline to sell this house within 3 years or we have to pay £100k stamp duty. Anyway DH is clued up on it all. But yes you have to be careful of tax implications.