not using estate agent to sell house

octatonic

richardhomer said:

capo4th;620277" said:

1.5% for taking some photos picking a price out of thin air and loading the details to the Internet is a shed load of cash.

Wrong!

What you should be employing is expertise - knowing the right buyers, understanding what makes your house appealing to the local market, able to handle negotiations in a manner that maintains the buyers goodwill - yet extracting the best possible offer for you, pro-actively progressing the sale via mortgage providers, solicitors and other agents in the chain, etc....

A 'good' agent will get you a higher price, in a shorter time-scale than selling it yourself.

A bad agent is as you describe.

If a seller chooses a bad agent, they probably haven't researched their options properly.

Agreed.

I'm happy to pay 1.5% to an agent if they can extract another £20-30k out of a buyer.

My main income is from property- a good agent is worth their weight in gold, much like a good accountant.

TimmyO

We are just getting ready to do the whole sell and buy thing. While I was scouring Rightmove for places to look at one that I had bookmarked was sold stc within a week. I looked at who the estate agent was (to see if they had others) and it was some odd website - when I went there it was a service that cost a few hundred quid but listed your place on Rightmove etc. For a bit more they'l stick a sign up, for a bit more they will do offer negotiations, for a bit more the person who does that won't be 12. 

Looked like a good deal and people tell me there are loads of these services. I'll be giving it a try.

midlifecrisis

1.5 % on my home is about 10k . how can they justify that these days of Internet

octatonic

midlifecrisis said:

1.5 % on my home is about 10k . how can they justify that these days of Internet

Again because there is more to it than just putting stuff online.

It is a sales job- they are trying to extract as much cash as possible for the client (the vendor).

Good agents are skilled at this and able to get you a better price.

Think of it like a good accountant.

Sure, you can do your taxes yourself, but a good accountant is able to save you money.

I accept that some people can't be convinced on this- but I have zero doubt that having a good agent on board is a distinct advantage when selling houses.

TimmyO

Ours is worth very little, so the scope for an agent getting us more is less (if that makes sense)

TonyR

Back in 2007 we decided to sell our house (the plan was to move to Austria at the time). I got several Estate Agents round and as the market was fairly buoyant at the time they wanted 2% of the asking price - which meant we'd have been paying them over £6k in fees, bugger that I thought and set about advertising the house ourselves.

I got a board from "The Little House Company" - which cost £99 at the time, the house was advertised on their site as well for that. I also created a nice website for our house. The site is called "The House Shop" now and I'm not sure whether it offers the same service - but it might be worth a look.

As it was we got one viewing in 6 months!

I think the one thing that went against us was not enough exposure and the house not being on Rightmove as only Estate Agents can list there.

As it was not long after the property market fell away so we took the house off the market.

The plans for Austria went by the wayside as the recession kicked in here, the value of the Pound against the Euro dropped like a stone and property prices in Austria started to rise as an alarming rate!

Last year we decided we'd like to move somewhere a bit more rural and where we didn't have to cross the centre of Leeds to get to work. So we put the house on the market again - this time we did use an Estate Agent (their fees this time were 1% of the asking price). The house was on the market for eight months, during which time we had a massive four viewings and no offers sadly. 

The thing going against us was at that time there were an awful lot of new build properties in the same price bracket as our house. We weren't able to offer the incentives the building companies were so were up against it.

If I'm honest I wasn't impressed with the agent we used at the time - they weren't very pro-active, it seemed they just put the house on Rightmove and that was it. The worst of it was the staff in the office couldn't remember my name and one of them was rude to me on the phone and all they wanted me to do was to reduce the price.

We took the house off the market again in October. It went back on the market with a different agent this March and within a week we'd had four viewings and an offer that we accepted. Again the fees with this agent are 1% of the selling price. I've been much happier with their service, they keep me up to date regularly, can remember my name and are never rude.

What I'd say is depending on where you are in the country and how buoyant the market is in your area it might be worth giving it a go selling your house yourself - you might just get lucky. 

If you do decide to use an agent the do your homework on the agents in your area - do you know people who have sold their houses? Which agent did they use? Knock them down on their fees too.

Good luck!

fastboy

In a fast market or if your house is very run of the mill I'd be inclined to avoid an agent however, I sometimes feel agents do either under value to get a quick sale and get their money with near zero effort or over value to pull you in to selling.

About 15 years ago when the market was hot, my sister used a company called the little house company who charged £199 + vat. All they basically did was provide a template and some guidelines and advertised the house on rightmove for you. You handled all the enquiries, calls and liaised with the solicitors.

She got a load of agent valuations and set the price. Her house was very run of the mill (3 bed detached in an area that sold quickly) however, her plot was particularly good as she had a big garden so she decided to price it £30k higher then all the estate agents advised. She had 2 viewings in a week and sold it at full asking price (£30k more then the agent suggested)! She obviously had to do more of the work but ended up about £34k better off as a result so an agent doesn't always pay!

Whilst I've never used them, if you look up Sarah Beeney's estate agent tepiloe who do fixed fee selling but also provide a valuation there's loads of bad reviews for this very reason - under valuing!

The negative reviews I've read have typically got agency valutations afterwards and tepiloe seem to value very low. It makes you wonder how much money they lose their clients as the happy testimonials say we sold our house in 2-3 days! Makes you wonder if a crooked account manager at a company like that might have a few 'buyers' in their pocket for back handers whilst making their job super simple.

midlifecrisis

Value of a house like anything else is what someone will pay. Agents can only advise

octatonic

midlifecrisis said:

Value of a house like anything else is what someone will pay. Agents can only advise

This simply isn't true.

It is a game of poker.

Sure, there is no magic closing technique but it is possible to make a buyer feel happy with paying a bit more than they thought they would.

People ultimately want to win- they want a bargain and they want to feel as though they got the best deal they could.

Most house owners simply don't have the sales skills to get the best price for themselves.

Some agents do.

richardhomer

octatonic;621115" said:

Most house owners simply don't have the sales skills to get the best price for themselves.Some agents do.

I agree - but I think it goes further than that. The agent's role as a 'go between' helps keep discussions going - beyond the point when a seller and buyer may have royally fallen out with each other, had they been dealing directly.

octatonic

richardhomer said:

octatonic;621115" said:

Most house owners simply don't have the sales skills to get the best price for themselves.Some agents do.

I agree - but I think it goes further than that. The agent's role as a 'go between' helps keep discussions going - beyond the point when a seller and buyer may have royally fallen out with each other, had they been dealing directly.

Yes, agree with that too.

chillidoggy

The agents I used in the past were useless. They talked the talk when it came to getting me signed up, but then all they did was put a d in the local paper, and one in their shop window for a couple of weeks. Rather than undervalue, I would have said they overvalued my house. I went through three different agents before I finally got a sale, at a reduced price.