Selling house - approaching estate agent

Lex Luthor

I've had my house on the market for 6-8 weeks and I'm trying to sell it privately. Had a few viewings but not enough to generate an offer yet. Whether it be bad time of year to sell, or everyone waiting on the budget outcome or its just not getting enough exposure on daft, the time has come for me to hand it over to an estate agent.

I don't have the time to do the viewings from now on, so I really don't have a choice but to let an EA do the work from here.

I'd like to use the estate agent that I bought the house through, as I feel they are best equipped to sell it as they are still involved in selling other units in the last phase of the estate and may have the ground work done with a possible cancellation list, etc. They are also I'm told the most popular in the town.

My plan is to get them to the house next Friday, but I've never dealt with one before, so should I just ask them to come & value the house and give me their price? How much should I expect to have to pay them? I already have an ad on daft, so they will know I have been trying to sell it for a while.

Any advice on what I should do?

Thanks.

antoinolachtnai

I think you should definitely ask at least two agents, possibly three

The main thing is to get some realistic views on valuation. We could kick this round on the board to no end, but really, you have to ask some agents, they are the most knowledgeable people in your area.

Do think about whether you are putting the agent into a conflict situation, i.e., whether they are already selling a large number of substantially similar properties for someone else.

You might as well be straight up about the fact that you've been trying to sell it, if you ask me.

Lex Luthor

antoinolachtnai wrote:

I think you should definitely ask at least two agents, possibly three.

The house is not my primary residence so I have to travel 90 miles to get to it, so I won't have too much time to meet with agents. Would it be a bad idea for them to arrive near to each other? How long do they need to value the house so I can try to arrange them out at certain times?

antoinolachtnai wrote:

Do think about whether you are putting the agent into a conflict situation, i.e., whether they are already selling a large number of substantially similar properties for someone else

I don't think so. They have already sold 2nd hand houses in this estate already even with the new units being sold at the same time. The good thing is that they are now only selling 3 bed units. Mine is a 2 bed unit of which there were only a handful so very few come back onto the market

antoinolachtnai wrote:

You might as well be straight up about the fact that you've been trying to sell it, if you ask me.

Its not like I'll be able to hide the fact. The ads been on daft next to a lot of their ads for other properties in the area, plus I have my For Sale sign outside the door anyway.

mad m

Lex who cares if they arrive near each other,they will be hoping to get your business.Let them all come at same time and see who is best for you and at what rates they will charge.

I think though its a bad time to sell a house especially with the budget coming up.No matter what you will be paying advertising fees in relation to Myhome.ie. My wife and I recently decided not to move and took our house off market and pulled out of a deal with house we were planning to buy.

Its a tough one to call at this stage,but what I have noticed in my area a lot of house were up for sale a longtime(Including mine) some are still for sale but most have gone Sale Agreed now. So its taking Estate agents a long time to get to sale agreed. Some houses on my estate agents website have withdrawn the sale of their house like us. The estate agent we used had a no sale no fee,so maybe try and see if someone is doing this. The estate agent we used reckons it will bomb along in Janurary though.

Lex Luthor

mad m wrote:

The estate agent we used reckons it will bomb along in Janurary though.

what do you mean? is that good or bad?

mad m

Sorry I was quoting him,he reckons it will pick up again and fly along.

Lex Luthor

mad m wrote:

Sorry I was quoting him,he reckons it will pick up again and fly along.

thank god for that....I was only saying it to the wife aswell the other night.

There has been such inactivity over the last 2 months that come Jan, we were thinking it would pick up again. Plus I'm selling in the fastest growing population county in Ireland so we're hoping we'll get a quick sale.

antoinolachtnai

I think they will take 45 minutes tops, probably less if you know what you are doing. I would get them all to arrive an hour or so apart. Personally, I would tell them you are speaking to three agents at that time.

I would not get them all to arrive at the same time. You will not get the most out of the meetings that way.

Ask them what they think is the best time to market it, they are the ones who are involved in the market.

Lex Luthor

I personally don't think the meetings should take all that long. I've done all the ground work and taken all the photographs/measurements and the ad I have on daft has 10 times more information on it than any ad I've seen by any estate agent.

whizzbang

I'm not so sure things will be that good in January, they have a lot of stock to get through. Check out http://daftwatch.atspace.com/ you can see the number of places for sale on daft has almost doubled since the slowdown started in the summer. That's a lot of properties to sell.

It would have to be one hell of a spring season for them to clear the backlog and for house sale times to come back down.

But who knows how the buyers will react to the budget?

antoinolachtnai

Well, if you have all the groundwork done, let them know that when you speak to them on the phone, and let them know that you just want to meet them to get their views on how they would go about marketing and selling your property. You could probably meet three of them in two hours so.

Do-more

whizzbang wrote:

I'm not so sure things will be that good in January, they have a lot of stock to get through. Check out http://daftwatch.atspace.com/ you can see the number of places for sale on daft has almost doubled since the slowdown started in the summer. That's a lot of properties to sell.

It would have to be one hell of a spring season for them to clear the backlog and for house sale times to come back down.

But who knows how the buyers will react to the budget?

If you look at the stock for sale in Kildare the build-up isn't nearly as great as the national figure, so you look to have a better chance of selling Lex.

IMO (but what the hell do I know?) because we have had a standoff pre-budget there maybe a spike in buying activity for a couple of months or so after the budget to release that pent up demand. But as Whizzbang implies it probably will only make a small dent in the overall supply figures.

However after that spike, if it happens, I think it will be a tough year for sellers.

(my 2 cents)

Lex Luthor

The house is in Wexford Do-more

Do-more

Lex Luthor wrote:

The house is in Wexford Do-more

Jaysus, your fecked so....Wexford Daft stock!

chump

hah, the agent said the market is gonna pick up in January. Thank gawd for that. Phew.

Over-sarcasm abuse I'll admit, but you're kidding yourself those comments from an EA and put any weight on them. Nothing's moving in the market, because the prices are too high. Some FTBs are no doubt holding out a while to see if there will be any budget day incentives, but that wouldn't have stopped them looking at houses and putting in provisional offers up to this point. Problem is affordability which is decaying with each interest rate decrease, coupled with the fact that 20-40% of buyers in the last few years have been investors and who in their right mind would buy as an investment at the current prices with little scope for capital appreciation.
On top of that investors have started bailing already, and more probably will bail after xmas - there will be a glut of houses on the market, and prices will fall.


All IMO of course.
Reduce the price to attract punters and get it done asap.

Lex Luthor

chump wrote:

Reduce the price to attract punters and get it done asap.

Its 10k cheaper than a 2 bed apt in the same development and mine is a house with 1 more bathroom.

Mine is priced very well judging by local prices. I'll see what the EA's say on Fri

I just got a call for a viewing on Fri just before the EA's and they seemed really eager so fingers crossed they like it. They were let down on the house they were just about to buy and know the area well where I'm selling and wanted to get something there before.

vesp

Do not forget to haggle hard with the estate agent on their fees. Some with charge you thousands for doing very little.

Lex Luthor

vesp wrote:

Do not forget to haggle hard with the estate agent on their fees. Some with charge you thousands for doing very little.

I rang one this morning and immediately they said "You have a For Sale sign up outside your house at the moment"

I replied "Yes I do but don't have the time to do viewings after this weekend, so are you interested in talking about taking it on"

Should be an interesting meeting

Lex Luthor

Met with 2 agents today. One is local to the area and has been established there for a long time, the other is one of the bigger nationwide agents (SF).

Both cost the same.

The local agent is currently selling units in the development in the last phase and was very keen to get my house as they said they have a list of names waiting on cancellations. Also told me that the property I'm selling that there are none of them left and they were in high demand.

SF agent came in with a valuation 10k more than the local agent which I thought was very optimistic.

Thinking of going with the local agent as they seemed to have more confidence they could sell it a lot quicker. SF agent said that it could take 2-3 months.