Why is my in-laws' gorgeous house not selling?!

[irisetta]

What is wrong with this listing? Some back story - my in-laws have been desperate to sell up for a while to be nearer to us. They live near Portsmouth, we are in St Albans. They have a beautiful house! It's 5 minutes walk from the beach in Lee-on-Solent, it's right next to the High Street but super quiet. Huge back garden. Beautifully renovated home, when they bought it it hasn't been touched in at least 30 years. It looks immaculate. No it doesn't have the open plan kitchen diner, but what there is, is perfect.

For the first 7 months while they were listing the house, the estate agent was effing up the RightMove listing quite badly - they were only appearing for people looking for bungalows, when it is not a bungalow 🤦 I noticed this recently. 🙄 After pointing it out, it's since been amended to appear to anyone looking for a 3 bedroom detached property in Lee-on-Solent.

Anyway, now that it's appearing to everyone who might want it, AND they've reduced the price (too much, IMO), my mum-in-law is somehow still convinced that the lovely estate agent is now doing his level best for them - still no viewings after a couple of weeks. And they've only EVER had 3 viewings, ever since it was first listed those 7 months ago - none of which were even proceedable. Thoughts, lovely ladies of Mumsnet?

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/173477669

That is just cruel. You can see the owners have been house proud. It may not be your taste, but then I may hate your house.

I totally agree with you @Calliopespa

It’s still not immaculate, gorgeous and perfect. And artex is a pain in the hole to get rid of.

Your in laws are clearly house proud and have made a sweet home they take care of.

It was £370k in 2012 and it needs a lot of updating. It’s priced on wishful-thinking not reality.

It’s not well staged and it’s been on the market too long. Shoot the estate agent and start again.

Who is the buyer? An older person won’t want the stairs albeit it’s a pimped up bungalow. Ditto it’s not a family home. I think your buyers are newly retired downsized empty nesters seduced by the seaside, a single person or childless couple or recently divorced downsizers. So stage it with a younger buyer in mind - hide the rugs, ideally tone down the colour, set a bonfire to the pine furniture, make more of that lovely (cluttered as hell) conservatory and the back garden, remove the kitty litter from the front garden.

Maybe you can move to Gosport instead of them moving to you:)

I’d market it as having a dining room instead of a bedroom downstairs.

Would I live there , possibly . Agree it's immaculate , but it's obvious it's owned by older people so it's not modern so it's probably not attracting the under 50s .
So the amount of people seeing it online and wanting to view will be limited . Throw in the selling price and you've got over 50s , downsizing from a more expensive property so a limited market again .

You'd had lots of replies. My two penneth is that the photos make it difficult to understand the downstairs layout. A lot of working people will want office space somewhere, but if they need all the bedrooms I'm struggling to work out where would be suitable. Also get the flag taken down and removed from the photo.

Why are you so defensive about your inlaws house? It's clearly overpriced.

If you are keen for them to live near you, you may need to suggest nearby but cheaper places.

It's a dated bungalow in an area where many similar bungalows have been modernised and are on the market under £500k. I would spend some time looking at other properties in the general area and consider whether it's direct location warrants being almost twice the price of similar properties.

Wow reading the comments I was expecting much worse and dated decor. I don't think the bathroom/kitchen are particularly dated. Glass shower cubicle, white cupboards etc.

Certainly a lot of clutter and too much furniture. And it is tricky because it wouldn't appeal to people looking for a bungalow because it's got stairs. But for someone looking for a house, it looks like a bungalow which is off putting. I would say on of the bedrooms should be restyled as a study.

Also the England flag in the first picture would put me off!!!

No, you’re not going mad. I also find dormer
(or chalet) bungalows an odd concept. But you are being very stubborn, and I don’t really understand why. Several people have explained on the thread what a dormer bungalow is; you’ve even looked it up yourself. But you’re still pounding your fists in frustration shouting “But it’s NOT a bungalow, it’s nooootttt, it has stairs!!!!”

You - more importantly, your in-laws - need to come to terms with the fact that estate agents WILL want to market this as a bungalow, despite your misgivings. And that is what I think is the problem with the house. It’s neither one thing or the other. Too much of the space is upstairs to appeal to traditional bungalow buyers, and too much is downstairs for someone wanting a family home. Why would they pay the premium that comes with a bungalow when they could get an ordinary house for less?

I don’t disagree with you that it’s an odd kind of bungalow. My parents bought one and I never really understood why. But no one is going to change the definition for you or me. And what you refer to as a “mistake” in the original listing meaning it came up in searches for bungalows almost certainly wasn’t a mistake.

If there’s genuine potential to extend downstairs, I would, as you suggest, make a key point of that in the marketing. But don’t be surprised if you get the feedback that buyers want it to already have been extended for that price.

Only got to page 3 so some comments on what has been said so far. It's a dormer bungalow and needs to be described that way. Elderly people looking for a bungalow are not necessarily put off by stairs since the rooms upstairs are for family when visiting and you sleep downstairs. You'll also get the elderly who are capable of stairs now but mindful that they may not be in 10 years time. It's a straight staircase too, simpler to fit a stair lift if you wanted one.

What will put off older people - it's a long way to the nearest station, what are buses to the local hospital like? Are there shops a flat walk away? The ground floor bedroom is at the front but it's a quiet looking road and double glazed windows. The lovely shower is unfortunately upstairs(not obvious on the floorplan which shows a single width but from the picture) so downstairs bath might need to be replaced. Showers are easy when you cant manage stairs.

It's not a flood risk area. https://www.getthedata.com/flood-map/lee-on-the-solent The agent has left out the link that would show that.

Remove the motorhome for the photos - google maps shows the garage and is a better image. The proximity to the sea/ rust issues are not that significant when windows are UPVC not metal and it's not that close to the sea anyway with other houses in the way to catch some of the salt in the wind.

Astroturf is a pain to remove and as you need to mow the back anyway real grass would be better. You dont want a lot of flowers and weeding. A couple of plant pots or hanging baskets to soften teh exterior.

There are not enough pictures of the garden. If it is really that great then you need a picture looking back towards the house. There are houses both sides and I wonder if it's too overlooked.

Aertex may be asbestos - that would concern me.

The kitchen layout wouldnt suit me, I like worktop nearer the oven. The cooker is next to the oven and it's all a but squashed up. If I bought it I'd put the oven across the room. Paint over the blue. It will look a bit too bright probably if it's all white so use AI to try different shades.

I understand why the shading is in the sun room but it probably would be betetr removed for the photos, you can see that people who havent had a sun room dont get it. If I bought I'd likely replace the roof with and insulated and/or tinted roof.

If you are marketing at families what are the local schools like?

Dormer bungalows that this one are quite likely to need the whole roof replaced to achieve modern insulation standards.

I think this is the problem with what is essentially a bungalow being extended into a 2 storey house. People who want a bungalow look for bungalows, people who want a house are likely to not bother with an extended bungalow.
Personally, all the blue and the clutter would make me initially skip past this listing. Perhaps suggest to them that they take away some of the ornaments and loud cushions, and some of the smaller items of furniture. The photos are not particularly good, don’t have a van sitting outside the place. Get another estate agent.

cost. too expensive. people have no money, especially if any part needs renovations

The photos are poor and need to be redone, but first de clutter and see if your in laws will stump up for a repaint in neutral colours. Get better photos of the back garden which is perfect for a young family.

Yes, I find it sad that people can be so put off by superficialities and blind themselves to the actual potential of a house.

Off topic but my late dad always said they were called bungalows as the builder decided to “bung it up low” 😂😂

Absolutely. It's really narrow minded, isn't it?

I would call this a chalet bungalow and would imagine the target audience is going to be an older couple or someone in a wheelchair. I don't think young families tend to go for this type of bungalow property. For an immediate improvement I'd get a painter in and go for something very neutral, as well as storing a lot of the personal belongings. Two nice planters put the front with trees would help the photos, as would Photoshopping out the flag and camper van. This house would never work for me, conservatory has great potential but it is tacked on randomly and doesn't have a good flow.

You all need to be more realistic about the house and it's price. Your OP description of it being perfect and so stunning does not the photos at all. You need to present the property to the seller as their potential house, not become defensive that they are being brutal about your home.

I don't think the bathroom/kitchen are particularly dated. Glass shower cubicle, white cupboards etc

I agree that the bathrooms don't look very dated. I wonder just how modern looking everyone on this thread's homes are. Are they are living in square boxes in new build housing estates? The kitchen isn't to my taste, nor is the decor but that can easily be changed.

I heard the joke as "we've run out of bricks, let's bung a low roof on!" 😊

I would imagine lots of posters on here have families/kids so a bungalow is just not on a wishlist. No young family i’ve ever known has lived in a bungalow, and having one bedroom on a different floor isn’t practical.

For me the kitchen is an issue. Not really the right shape to be eat in, despite being a good size. That tiny, cheap, table and chairs are just floating awkwardly; it doesn't say cosy kitchen supper. So I'd be looking to extend as a buyer. And that's a cost that maybe won't add enough to the house to justify the cost, especially with current building prices.

Agree that it's a house they bought, did up to their tastes/fashions at the time and have then happily lived in. But to a young family looking to buy it looks dated. It just doesn't feel that way to the current owners because of their emotional investment. Perfectly normal, but financially undeniable.

It is over-priced for that area. If they want to sell, they need to drop it substantially. The market is slow and the house is nice but not worth over 600K. It would need a fair bit of decorative modernisation, too, which puts people off. All that work has become much more expensive and its hard to find good and reliable workmen.

So then it becomes a very expensive two-bedroom house! Who’s going to want it?

As I said in my earlier post, I get the issues with dormer bungalows. But that’s what it is, and it would be reducing the market further trying to pretend otherwise.