Dan the Plumber

Hi all,
I'm sure there are loads of you going through the same thing! Just had house valued, and without being greedy were really dissapointed and dis heartened at the outcome! Estate agent basically gave the doom and gloom, loads of houses on market, taking ages to sell, should have sold last year!!!:curse:
Makes it even worse as have spent countless hours building extension, fitting new bathroom, kitchen, wooden flooring etc to make the house 'ready' to move into for someone else!! Seems like I shouldn't have bothered doing anything and sold for few grand less!! We have a sizeable mortgage too so need every penny we can get hold of!! What is the general concensus - do we try and hang on for decent price (and wait) or just market it to sell quickly? In a real dilema over this!!
Sorry to have a moan! Interested in hearing from others in same situation!
Dan
Ps Going to WA too and we all know about prices there!!

Issie

When we had our house valued they valued it £ 10,000 less than what we wanted and what we needed. So we decided that we would go with what we thought and priced it higher. 16 weeks later we have had full asking price and they have also bought furniture from us too. I suppose it depends on how much time you have, we are not going until January so we did have a bit of time to play with.

Good luck with your decision

juss44

Hi Dan, where are you from? Lots of us with houses on the market and no joy It picks up about now so I keep being told

Just sit back and go with the flow for now, how far are you in with your application.

Juss

mike-Ju

When do you plan to leave UK?

I plan to leave in 2009 but Im putting the house on the market next spring to make sure I get shot of the place, I can allways rent until ready to go. a house up the road from me, much older ex council house sold for £150k so Im going to put my house on for £160k and wait for the market to catch up with my house and if it doesnt I can allways reduce it.

I'll be in no rush so dont really mind it being on the market for 14 months

iceman

Dan,
We have been in the same situation as you and exactly the same thing happened. To cut a long story short, we went on the market in April, and found a buyer in June but then they pulled out. So we remarketed again and eventually sold last month again. Then the surveyor downvalued it by 5K, which held up everything. We have sold for 15K less than we hoped to.It feels sometimes like you are giving your harwork and money away, but a house is worth what someone is willing to pay for it. I don't think the market is bad, but it has been rampant for the last few years and is slowing down. The fact that there are alot of properties to choose from will make it appear slower, as supply is higher in relation to demand now than it was some years ago. This will have the effect of stabilising prices.

As for waiting, we decided not to, but the maret could go either way, but in my humble opinion, as wages are not rising in line with property, and due to the recent oush on affordable houses, we decided to take the money and run with it. The market is something beyond my control.

markandgill

Hi I know how you feel, we are in the same position, we have quite a large mortgage and our house has been up for sale for just over 2 months, we were told by the estate agent at the time the market was still strong and told us to put or house on the market for 225k but to expect to get up to
250k.

We were really pleased with this as this would give us just over 100k to take with us and we expected the house to be sold within a couple of weeks as a house around the corner for us was up for sale in June for only 2 weeks and it sold for 50k more than the asking price.

Well no such luck, we have had 4 viewers in the last 2 months and only 1 person has actually got their house up for sale, she is quite interested but she is in the same position as us.

We are really annoyed and regret not putting our house up for sale a month earlier.

Lets keep our fingers crossed and hope the market will start moving again.

Tiggs+Graz

I know how you feel - we should have sold our house 18 months ago but we decided to finish all the work that needed doing. Looking likely now that we will end up with a selling price that is the same as it would have been plus what we have spent. (if you see what i mean) So if we had sold it then it would have been much easier to sell (everything around here was selling within days of being on the market) and we wouldnt have had to do all the work - and we would be no worse off.

Cant go back in time now - just have to sit here and wait ...

Dan the Plumber

Thanks mate,
Yeah will prob put it at the high end at least for a couple of weeks!! Were kind of hoping to be gone before christmas but I guess that will be a push!
Good luck to you too!

Dan the Plumber

Hi Juss,
In Worcestershire. Hope it will sell quickly ( like we all hope!!), Estate agent wasn't so optimistic though! Fingers crossed!!
Oh and no application I'm Australian by birth - wife and I first emigrated in 1994!!
Dan

Dan the Plumber

Plan to go asap!! Hopefully before Xmas this year but we will see.. You have the right idea I think, we have left it too late before putting on the market and wanting to go. Mind you we only came to the decision recently!
Best of luck,
Dan

pumpkin blossom

We have had our house on the market since May 2006. We had it valued by 3 estate agents. One said £130k, one £120k and another one £115k. Hubbie wanted to put it up for £130k but I didn't think that was a realistic price so we went for £120k.
We got loads of viewers, after 3 weeks had an offer of £100k. We said no. Had lots more viewers. Our house has unusual parking and this was putting people off. We dropped the price in October to £115k and got an offer for £112,500 nearly straight away. Six weeks later the sale fell through because the chain had collapsed. We put it back on the market at £112,500 and never heared back from that person again. By this time it was full blown winter and we were not getting viewings, which we weren't supprised about, because of the time of year.
We dropped the price to £107,500 in the spring when the market SHOULD have been picking up, but we wern't getting viewings.
A couple of months ago we had an offer of £98k, we said no,they offered £100k, we said no, then wobbled and said yes. They had found another house. They then came back a couple of weeks later and offered us £98k again. We said no again, then they offered £100k again. We said yes, but that we wouldn't go a penny lower, they then withdrew the offer a day later as they could only afford £98k.
We now have a buyer who has had a survey done and agreed a sale without an estate agent for £104k.

The market where we are at least really has slowed right down, it isn't just our house which wasn't selling, it is all of the ones around here. There has been a little spate the last couple of weeks of sold signs though so it looks like it is picking up a bit.

Good luck with your house. You can always tell them to market it for more if you have the time to wait. Personally I would just want to get rid.

Dan the Plumber

Yeah I do know what you mean! i dread to think how much we have spent on the place. Not that that matters because we were staying here for good until quite recently. Just puts it all into perspective when you decide to sell!! When we bought the place it had been painted and (trust me) the cheapest of the cheap carpets put in , everything original, ie 20 year old kitchen, bathroom etc etc. Estate agent said even if we hadn't extended we too would be selling for the same price as not doing anything to the place. Ie left it as is! But of course thousands spent which we won't now see only for someone else to benefit from!!!
AAAGGGHHHH!!!!:curse:
Dan

Hel&Will

God I cannot believe how different the housing market is here in the South East. We had the house valued last week at £245-255K. Estate agent suggested putting it on market at £265k to stop people offering £250K for the stamp duty threshold. Went on market Saturday - 4 viewings and 3 days later it sold for £260k! Also had a lovely note put through door by one of the viewers who it turned out were too slow to put in an offer saying that if our buyers pull out to call them straight away. I had been watching the market for the last few months so knew that a house usually sells within a month but we didn't expect that quicker response.

None of the estate agents around here are coming up with doom and gloom stories, just saying that the market might start to slow down at the end of the year but only if interest rates rise again.

I had no idea the housing market in other parts of the UK had taken a turn for the worse and hope that you all manage to sell your houses soon.

Hel

TMRE

Blimey that's quick. We are in Ashford, Kent and the market has slowed right down. Been on since may and only had 3 viewers! Priced 10k below valuation and other similar houses as well

Up To Late

It's the same in Cardiff. House on the market since June. Lots of viewers in June and July. Accepted offer in July. Buyers pulled out 3 weeks later. Only had one viewing since, even though we reduced the price by £26K. We have some friends in the same boat too. Whole market seems to have come to a standstill.