It’s obvious that when you want to sell a property, many of us rely on estate agents to give us the values. And as you’ve seen on television many a time with a lot of these property programs, they can give considerably different values. There’s sometimes two or three agents that come in and they’ll all give you different values.
Now, some of them, a bit unscrupulous, will give you a higher value than what the true market value is. Or say, “Oh, I can get this for your property”. Just to get you on the books. And this happens a lot. I see it all the time.
So you must be wary of that.
If you’re putting your house on the market, the price is important.
Say, if you’ve got a three bedroom semi-detached, and you want to sell it. And you think, “The agent says, ‘I’ll get you £120,000 for it.'” And you know for a fact that one very similar down the down the street is for sale for a £100,000, you don’t start much chance of selling yours before the other one.
So be very wary of what agents tell you.
And I always say again and again, do your research. So go on the proper portals. Now these days, valuing a property is a lot easier than it ever used to be because we’ve got portals such as Rightmove and Zoopla.
Have a look and see what’s for sale near by, comparing similar type properties.
So if you have a three bedroom semi, look for a three bedroom semi in the same street. Then expand out into the next street, and look what’s for sale.
And importantly, look what’s got a sold sign on it, or an under offer. You should also look at historical data as much as possible, although it’s the data today that determines what the value is. But it’s always helpful to look at the sold prices.
Again, you can do this on Rightmove and Zoopla. Just put your post code in, and it should come up with the sold prices, if there has been sales.
Ideally, you want the ones in the last one or two years. Older than that, they’re not really relevant.
They’re out of date, and circumstances change. So look for very up to date data. Like I said, under a year if possible.
Now armed with having a better understanding of your property’s value, you can have a better chance of selling your home in a timely manner.
So be very, very careful of just taking an agents valuation on face value. Check things out.
Put yourself in a position that you’ve got this knowledge before they even come to value your property. Then when they do come and value, you’ve got the data and say, “Well, look. I’ve seen this selling at this price. Why do you say it can go for X price?” Make them explain themselves. Challenge them all the time.
You want to put your property at a price that’s attracts serious buyers.
And that’s where you want to be. Don’t set it too high. Don’t sell it too low. Just do your research, and you should come out with a true market price.
If you want to have a chat about this anytime, please feel free to give me a call at 0191 486 2386.
