Why isn’t my house selling?

[rootsandwings89]

Honest feedback please. We recently had a buyer pull out and after re-marketing it 6 weeks ago we still don’t have a buyer. I just don’t understand it, our house is very well priced for the area, we live walking distance to town, train station and a popular school.

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/91713960proper

I wouldnt be worried about the leasehold but its the size. Obviously the photos are taken with the standard estate agent wide lenses but it is really a 2 bed.
A few years ago I lived in a 3 storey townhouse with the same dimensions as yours and what looks like the same kitchen layout. There is not enough work space and the dining end is also small. The conservatory is a minus point not a plus. Is there a shower in the bathroom? there is no mention or photo to show.
If you put the area and £250,000 into the Rightmove search there are better options. Sorry

Lovely long garden. Tthat should be a useful selling point.
Nothing wrong with this cosy house at all except it appears to be very small with very little storage space, and that puts buyers off if they have families.
A retired couple interested in gardening and looking to downsize might be interested. Or possibly a starter couple working from home who could have an office each.
Good luck OP.

Honestly! It’s not due to lack of flowers in pots ..it’s not the house

the market is abysmal . It will sell but it will take time

Nice enough but the pics are a bit dull. Lack of downstairs loo/cloakroom would put me off.

I think market is as two bedrooms with office and is the bathroom only three foot really? Seems very small

Leasehold would be a no no for me...

The leasehold, I wouldn’t go near a leasehold house even if it’s lovely like yours

Nice, clean looking house. The Leasehold thing will put a lot of buyers off. I’d never consider leasehold and I know most other people would be cautious. The kitchen diner is small and as others have said I would add a proper dining table. The bedrooms are all very small too. Bedroom 3 in particular is almost just an office/ nursery. Nothing you can do about that but it will mean buyers can be more choosy especially with the market being what it is right now. Heading towards winter is a notoriously hard time to sell a house. People don’t want to be moving over Christmas and it’s a little too late to assume they’ll definitely in their new home by Christmas. Again nothing you can do about that but you need to price accordingly. Looking at the area and the size of house you need to reduce to around £220k.

I think it’s the bedroom photos they make the bedrooms look very small

Wow, that is such a lot of 2010s grey, almost the whole house including kitchen cabinets and even the flooring... . Like the green colour in the downstairs loo though.

My late parents house has been up for sale foe 2 weeks, only 1 viewing who said while the house & location were lovely, the bathroom was too small, honestly they were tyre kickers. The estate agent told me that the market will pick up in October, September is usually slow as the kids have just gone back to school & parents are getting over the expense of kitting them out.

The bathroom measurements might be wrong. On the plan it looks the same width as the 3rd bedroom, so how come it is narrower? The length must be correct to accommodate the bath.

House is lovely. So it must be the leasehold issue or the price.

I don't think the grey would worry me because whatever colour it was it probably wouldn't be my taste so I would change accordingly, things like decor don't really bother me if buying a house. I don't like grey or white and most houses seem to be that colour inside

Honestly, it's the market. We just exchanged this week. 18 months after first listing. We lost 1 buyer along the way. Selling for less than we paid 5 years ago and £70k less than we first listed for, having done lots of work to the house (it's a separation).

I'm now moving into rented because the upward chain has stalled. It's truly a terrible, terrible market atm. I'm telling people not to bother unless they really need to.

I hope it sells for you soon, but I think most people are having a rough ride.

Bedrooms are all very small which would put me off. I also don’t like conservatories. Garden is lovely though and it’s all looks well kept!

Really appreciate everyone’s feedback. We want our onward chain house so badly but starting to worry about how the process is affecting our mental health to be honest, it’s so consuming and I can’t remember the last time I slept properly.

what I don’t understand is although the market is terrible, isn’t it likely to get worse? I thought people would want to move before interest rates get bigger than they already are?

@rootsandwings89 I have been looking for months as a FTB. Like a lot of people, I am worried about my job security so although the interest rates worry me what worries me more is becoming a mortgage prisoner or not being able to pay the mortgage so I figure that building up a bigger deposit will mitigate some of that. Prices in real terms are still falling, at least in the area I want to buy in. I have also researched enough about leasehold tenures to know that they are - in my opinion - to be avoided so this limits my scope.

All in all, I figure I may as well wait for at least another six months and am prepared to pay about 6 - 7 % interest by then (still within the normal range).

I also wonder if renting has become more of a desirable option for some since the RRA came in a few months ago, giving more rights to renters.

When the market is bad i think those who don't have to move tend to sit tight and wait ? So there are less buyers around.

The mortgage costs are already at a level where lots of people are just shelving their buying plans, if rates start rising more that then starts to affect people who already have mortgage debt.

What are they waiting for though, rates appear to need to go higher, avoiding a sensible price cut now can mean bigger losses down the road? Some people can still get mortgages, and afford them, you just need to sweeten the deal with some reality to attract them to your property.

If I was looking for a 3 bed I would discount yours for the bedroom sizes and lack of dining space, sorry. It's very well presented so I don't think there's much you can improve on. Your market might be people looking for a 2 bed + office set up? How do prices compare with larger 2 beds in the area?

Waiting for a job promotion, waiting for an inheritance, waiting to see if they pass their probationary period in their new job, waiting for prices to reduce further, waiting to build up a bigger deposit…hopefully that’s clear now.

You cannot predict the economy. One school of thought is that 15 years of very low interest rates drove significant asset-price inflation and that we are now going through an adjustment. If there is a recession, the government and Bank of England may cut rates, but whether that happens, when it happens, and what effect it has on prices is impossible to know.
So I think you need to look at the options in front of you rather than trying to predict the market. If you want to sell now, you probably have to reduce the price to where buyers are willing to transact. Alternatively, you can hold on and roll the dice that the market improves.
There are not really many other levers. You are selling a two-bed leasehold house in a segment of the market where a lot of properties are struggling to sell at the moment. Hopefully you are in a position financially to wait if necessary, and equally, if prices have softened, hopefully you are also benefiting from that on whatever you are looking to buy next.

OP, this is such a little thing, that I wondered about posting at all!
But it really puts me off that you walk into lounge, and into a sofa. Then to get to kitchen, you have to squeeze through a gap between the sofa and table.
Would having the sofas opposite each other, perpendicular to the fireplace work? Like this: