Estate Agent - Valuation

use your own instinct on value, the last 4 houses i have sold in the last 18 months we have always priced higher than the agents valuation and lifted the max for the that st, if everything is done and in good order you can command a premium otherwise be prepared to pitch it lower. always start high as you can always reduce if no interest but you cant put price up.

---------- Post added 04-03-2016 at 09:08 ----------

Get two or three valuations. Play them off against each other on the fee. I've just put my house on the market with a highly regarded agent for roughly half of their normal fee. That will save me over a thousand quid.

good advice 3/4 %-1% is a good fee or agree a fixed all inclusive, i use the same agent now and save money

While everyone want's to minimise their costs of sale, in the majority of case having a knowledgeable, competent, proactive and communicative agent will be worth their fees several times over. I have personally had experience of using very good and very crap agents. So don't be fooled by 0.25% cheaper fee and a shiny cheap next suit.

 

And if you really think you want the hassle of dealing with your own sale, be prepared to spend significant time dealing with enquiries, tire kickers, and human's who say one thing and do another. It's not a free lunch!

Well said. Getting an offer is the easy bit. That's where the hard work starts and a decent agent earns their fee from the offer onwards to get the sale over the line.

Also, think about what you are actually getting as different agents offer different services eg some will do all the viewings and will be more capable than most homeowners of presenting the house to viewers. We do this for our clients and we do charge more to cover the time this takes.

I'd recommend avoiding the agents that are cheaper with a non-returnable upfront fee and insist on payment only on completion which will keep your agent keen.

---------- Post added 04-03-2016 at 17:27 ----------

use your own instinct on value, the last 4 houses i have sold in the last 18 months we have always priced higher than the agents valuation and lifted the max for the that st, if everything is done and in good order you can command a premium otherwise be prepared to pitch it lower. always start high as you can always reduce if no interest but you cant put price up.

Not sure I'd agree with this although it has clearly worked for you.

The trick is to price low enough to get enough interest, plenty of viewings and have people bidding for the property and then the offer price will often be higher than the initial asking price.

Start too high and you miss out on many potential buyers. Yes, you can reduce the asking price later but the first couple of weeks after listing is crucial as newly listed properties get loads more online views and therefore physical viewings leading to offers. Do this period at the wrong price and you miss out on all that interest

To answer the OP, any agent worth their salt will advise on what needs doing in order to market the property in it's best light. I imagine by some of the pictures some agents put up that all they do is call and take photo's with their phones.

Staging a house correctly can add 5% to your property and triple the number of viewings that you get.

Make sure you get more than one quote. We had one from *** and it was £75K. . We had another from *** and it was £125k. Robbing so and so's

We had blundells out to value our old house that came up with a figure which was less than the purchase price we paid 5 years earlier, we ended up going with a Pinks for a fixed fee of around £700 and got an offer for £50k more than blundells said I would get within the first week.