What’s wrong with my house?

[Blueysothermother]

House been on the market since Easter, it’s in the catchment for the much sought after local grammar, well priced, was valued originally at £595,000. We had an offer for £575,750 which we accepted during the summer hols but then fell though due to reasons unrelated to the house. We need to relocate, so dropped the price, even though much larger than most houses in the surrounding streets and better parking. Estate agents can offer no constructive feedback that I can act upon. I get that it’s not all grey etc but it’s a period house and has a wealth of features intact. Any ideas?
www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/91344150

This ⬆️. Excellent points.

It's not four beds. If you're comparing it to 4 bed places locally it must be well over priced.

I love it OP! I hope you have more luck soon.

Thanks, I’ve always ignored that section of RM 🤔

The closest in price I can see is an actual 4-bedroom (similar layout) property sold for £550K.

You have redecorated the kitchen many times? In what way? Why would you not cover up those awful pipes in the corner?

i’m gonna be honest it looks really dated, the colours on the walls are questionable. And it’s not four bedroom. It actually looks cold.

I like the style of house, but it screams out to me that work is needed. Did a professional install the kitchen? The photos show really poorly fitted doors etc. They are not flush etc. kick boards wonky. This would be a red flag for me as I would wonder about the quality of any work carried out.
The lean to needs to go. I’d be really interested to see a survey report for this property.
It could be an amazing property with work, but people looking for multi beds at that price point will struggle financially & logistically to do that with kids in tow.

The reality is though, that if the place isn't to the new owner's taste they'll need to do all that work anyway, so something priced in recognition of that will be more appealing.

It's not you, it's the market nationwide. Very difficult selling anywhere. I would change the wording on the plan from lean-to, to utility room/storage or something similar. Lean-to sounds like a shed. Also, I know it is period, but losing a bit of seating and a few pictures out of the sitting room would make it look bigger on photos, as would painting over the deep blue walls in a lighter colour. Your room sizes are excellent but the pictures make them look small and cottagey.

It's not a four bed house.
If I needed four bedrooms I would not even come for a viewing.
The rooms look much smaller than they probably are due to the furniture being big and the colours on the walls .
It maybe you love it but if you want it sold you need to be unemotional about this, get it painted in calm neutral colours, get it staged with appropriate furniture and get the garden tidied up.
I love period properties but would be put off at that price because if have to decorate it all in more neutral tones.

OP I think you’re really out of date sorry. These two houses are much more airy, bright, and spacious than yours or at least they look that way in the photos. They’re not grey or characterless, personally I find yours characterless as it looks like a mismatch of everything. I used to work in design so am not completely clueless. I am in my late 30’s and will be looking for bigger house like yours soon for our small family and I would be more excited by the two posted here than yours because they are open, bright, work and redecorating would be minimal and the garden is bigger. I’d go for yours if it was cheaper though as then the work may not matter as much.

Good points - and it's down to the price.

I don't think there's any point painting it beige. There'll be as many people who think that needs changing as want to change the bright colours. I like it, there are some rooms I'd want to change, and I might worry that the blue would take a lot of coats!

The real things that would make me walk away are I'm not sure if there's much quality to the kitchen, or the finish in the bathroom, and that would make me wonder what else has been done on the cheap/ DIY by people without the required skills. The downstairs loo without a sink. The lean to looks like it needs rebuilding, which is a big project, but the biggest one is I can't see how bedroom four can be used as a bedroom, with access through another bedroom, so if I wanted four bedrooms, which would be why I'd looked at your house in the first place, this would be a non starter.

They're all things that are what they are but price needs to reflect it and you're expecting a much bigger profit than a general change in the market would suggest.

I love the garden, that's my dream space, but it could do with a light tidy, maybe some jet washing.

I agree about the kitchen cupboards. The kitchen would look much more attractive if the green cupboards were replaced with some that matched the base units. And they say that kitchens and bathrooms sell houses!

The lounge might seem bigger if the walls were neutral and there were fewer pictures.

And I'd market it as a 3-4 bedroom property. The walk-through study couldn't be used as a bedroom if you were considering renting out rooms to generate some income.

It's a lovely house, but it's a hard market at the moment. It's a buyers market with such high interest rates so the price will need to be adjusted.

I would say though, I don't understand the dining room. The blue, the dark doors and skirting along with the table aren't in keeping with the rest of the house which seems to be a lot brighter.

Terrible market for sellers atm, nothing wrong with your house, also budget Weds, the other issue that sellers will be facing is nobody wants to move at Christmas so will often put off moving til the new year.

OP needs to think who her buyer is.
If RM is right, she moved there 20+ years ago.

So is it aimed at first time buyers?
With children?

Where will they move from?
Why Watford?
Why that street?
Schools? Transport links?

Parking looks tricky. How much space on the street for visitors or maybe 2 car couples?
Garden- can only see a patio.
Kitchen - really needs extending out the back.

If it's aimed at young couples, they often don't want to do loads of DIY as they are working full time. Or they can't afford to refurbish. Many want a turnkey house or a do-er upper at the right price, with space to grow into.

I genuinely don't know why agents don't advise on staging.
It's their job to SELL a house not just take photos.
They also need to tell clients honestly what their house is worth and what needs attention.

I think if you wait until after Christmas to reduce the price you will be further behind the curve.
Reduce it 30k now, and if necessary another 30k in the new year. We are in a price reset period, thats about to get worse, as interest rates increase.
The longer you wait to bite the bullet the less your going to get - thats assuming you want to sell over the next couple of years whilst things even out... You could always wait for the next time markets start to rise but that could be quite a while and from a lower start point anyway. You were extremely fortunate to get an offer of 575k earlier this year. Things are changing fairly rapidly now though so if you want to sell recognise its just the price thats holding it back. Other than that its a lovely home for someone. Wish you luck.

@Blueysothermother contrary to what a lot of pther people said... we loved the plants and artwork everywhere when we viewed in the house we have just bought. It looked like a cosy, well loved home. It also looked colourful which i realise now is mainly due to their rugs, art and plants as its feeling very grey for us currently!!!

I honestly think at the moment a lot of it is luck too.... we sold our house for asking price, 3 months from calling the estate agent to completion. In the sw, but not a great part of town, and a victorian house too. We had some colour inside but mainly white and sunshine yellows which made it bright and airy. But another house on our old road looks in much better condition, and is bigger, has struggled and now been reduced to less than ours. Honestly no idea why we were so lucky!

I was going to comment on the Tindersticks connection! :-D

OP The only thing I don't like there is the fact you have to go through a bedroom to get to the other bedroom, i would add a partition and make a corridor and make a smaller study/boxroom there

Yes that was a genuine 4 bed. Not a 3 bed with study. Its also relevant that the price was agreed in spring 2025. The market in Watford has had a bit of a nose dive since. The ops house is just overpriced, nothing wrong with it.

I'm sorry but if the kitchen has been done in the last couple of years it really hasn't been done well enough. The cupboards don't match, and both sets look cheap. If the cooker is beside the door from the dining room then I suppose it must be a free standing one squashed in a corner, if it were a decent range I'm sure there would be a photo. The neatest solution would be a built in oven and hob, and I'm surprised you didn't do that if you really did put that kitchen in recently. There are seriously scruffy exposed pipes to the left of the boiler and a trailing wire hanging down beside the left hand end of the green cupboards.

The downstairs loo needs a basin, even if it's tiny. Not being able to wash hands is grim. While the plumber was at it they could tidy up the boxing in.

It's a perfectly nice 3 bed house that needs a lot of work. It's not selling because it is probably too expensive for a 3 bed that someone is going to have to spend a lot of money on .

Another perspective is this: everything needs doing. So it doesn’t matter what colour the walls are. The lean to needs to be rebuilt, the kitchen needs to be knocked into the breakfast room, new kitchen, new bathroom, repaint throughout. It requires a lot of work and that needs to be factored into the price.

I think, given the huge range of comments and advice on here, the one lesson learned is to check the quality of EAs photos and blurb very very carefully before publication!!

I don’t think any work is NEEDED. Are you seriously saying that someone woukd be out off a house because of the location of the toilet roll in the bathroom? There’s nothing wrong with the kitchen at all - if it’s not to the buyers’ taste, then just changing or painting the cupboard doors would completely change the look of it. I can’t see anything in the house that would put me off if I wanted a house in that area and was happy with the layout. There is nothing major that needs to be done, most things woukd be an easy DIY project, and can be changed gradually.

Hard to believe we are looking at the same house!

Yes, the bathroom would infuriate me and possibly you too if you almost dislocated your shoulder trying to reach for the loo roll! Details like that matter. The bathroom needs replacing. It's dated and badly designed. It's not maximising the space.

The kitchen is poor- did you notice the exposed pipes from the boiler and the odd boxing-in on the work top under the boiler? They have half-replaced the units - no idea why, as matching wall units would not be that much added cost.

There is no space for a for a washing machine. (It's in the lean-to which is falling apart.)

The window frames look in poor condition. So maybe £20K for new double glazing?

The floors are a mix of vinyl 'floorboards', original floorboards, painted floorboards, carpets and vinyl.

Ideally it should all run seamlessly through the house with one type of flooring or at least floorboards all the same type, and carpet.

It is not an easy DIY project- it's about a year of hard work and needs traders to sort a lot of things out.

New kitchen
Extension to house a washing machine and make it an eat-in kitchen
New downstairs loo (tatty and no washbasin)
New bathroom
Windows double glazed
Flooring co-ordinated- floorboards sanded, varnished, or replaced with carpets
Victorian fireplaces restored to original colours

Sorry OP but I think your house looks shabby from the pictures.
I live in a period house so it's not that people 'want a grey new build' but I'd be looking at your house as a renovation project and would expect to see it priced as such.

The lean to at the back looks like it needs rebuilding (if it's in good structural condition you should paint the timber), the bathroom and kitchen also look like they could do with being replaced. The dining room with the black and blue looks awful and oppresive. The yellow room has cables everywhere which suggests not enough plug sockets etc etc.

Sorry if that's all a bit brutal but that's probably why it's not sold.