When to put house on the market?

[Feierabend]

May I ask you wise ladies what you think about this: We need to upgrade to a proper family home some time soon. We want to stay in our village and there aren't many big properties on the market so it might take us months to find the right one, or we might stumble upon it tomorrow. Our current house would probably sell quickly - similar houses on this road go within 3-4 weeks. The estate agent wants us to put our house on the market because we'll then be 'in a stronger position to make a credible offer when we find the right house' but we don't want to be under the pressure of having to move out before we've found the right family home. So... what to do?

How many houses are there in your village that you would be interested in? Would it be worth leafleting the ones you like to test if any are likely to be available in the near future? How much demand is there for the type of property you are looking for?

If you are firmly committed to staying in your village and are very confident that you could sell your existing house quickly you can probably afford to wait to put your house on the market until you find the one you want BUT only if there is not going to be lots of competition for the house you want. Most sellers won't take seriously offers from people who aren't in a position to move straight away.

There is one road of about 100 houses that are pretty much all the same, they would make a perfect family home. They are pretty popular so you are right there would be competition, in the last year 4 or 5 of them got sold. Yes maybe leafleting would be a good idea. If we do have to put our house on the market first, I think we'd wait until spring when hopefully things pick up a bit, at the moment there is nothing really that we'd even want to view. What if we end up having a buyer but have nowhere to move to - we might end up telling him that we're not selling after all. Is that very bad?

Most vendors will only take an offer seriously if the buyer is "proceedable" ie under offer themselves first time or cash buyer.

Nope, its not bad - just be upfront at the start, say you're not prepared to move into rented and that you are completing only when you have somewhere to move to.

And be very firm with the agent about this.

Okay, thanks very much! Keep your fingers crossed!

We just bought and sold, and we rejected our highest offer on our house in favour of the second highest because the people offering the second highest were in a position to move and the highest people hadn't sold yet.

If you find your dream house, you risk the vendors rejecting your offer because your house isn't even on the market, let alone been sold.

There's no point "being firm" with the estate agents because vendors will just reject your offer because an offer to buy a house when you haven't even put your own house on the market is pretty unattractive to the vendor.

Have you thought about moving into rented?

Oh, and to answer one of your other questions - what if you find a buyer but then don't find anywhere to move to - yes, if I was that buyer and I got any wind at all that you were not 100% committed to moving out, then I would continue looking at other properties, and if I found another house then I would withdraw my offer on your house.

And even if it was taking you several months to find somewhere because your criteria are so specific (fair enough from your point of view, but not the buyer's) then I still might pull out and find somewhere else.

Sorry to be so negative! Basically, my advice would be:

put your own house on the market
sell your own house (hopefully!)
move into rented
find your perfect dream home to buy