12 Top Tips to Sell Your House Faster

How to sell your house

Listed your property with an agent but not receiving any enquiries from potential buyers?

Rest assured, on average, properties take over 2-4 months before a buyer becomes interested and completes; Some properties may even be on the market for a year before a buyer is found.

This short guide aims to provide you with some guidance and tips in order to improve your chances of selling your property.

Content

• 12 Tips for selling your house
• Negative factors
• Why won’t my house sell?
• Considerations

12 Tips For Selling Your House Quickly

Below we have listed 12 tips which could improve your chances of finding a buyer.

These points may also apply to new estate agents with little experience requiring some guidance.

1. First Impressions

The first impressions of your house play an extremely important role to potential buyers viewing the property. It is thought that buyers will make up their mind within 5 minutes of a property viewing of whether they will buy or not.

Ensuring the exterior – driveway, entrance and hallway of your property is pristine will provide a good first impression to prospective buyers.

Along with first impressions of viewings, ensuring that the main imaged used for your property advertisement online and in newspapers is highly important – How many times have you clicked through / read more about a property listing where the main image is an obscure image of a fireplace/garden etc.

2. Time of Year

The time of year plays a fairly important role when selling a house.

In general, spring and autumn are the optimum times to list a house for sale, followed by summer and then winter.

If you decide to sell your house during the winter, consider waiting until early spring to list the property, as you’ll receive a higher number of prospective buyers – which will encourage competition between buyers, leading to a potentially higher selling price.

Learn more about the best time to sell a house.

3. Correct Pricing

Ensure you have researched the area of past house sales to gauge an idea of what you should set your selling price at.

However if you’re selling through an agent, they will provide an estimated selling price, as will a mortgage lender.

If there is a similar sized property for sale in the area, you could potentially undercut their selling price – provided it is not too far below market value.

In theory, this should provide you with more prospective buyers.

4. Choose an Experienced Agent

You may be tempted to sell your house without an agent, however this is not advisable – there are various reasons you should sell through an agent, such as their experience in local markets and negotiations.

When deciding on which agent to contact, of course the agent’s fees and commissions are important.

However if you are intending for a quick sale, you should note if they have sold a similar property in the past, will they conduct viewings themselves, what is their estimate the selling price.

Further to this, you should ensure that they list their property on as many portals as possible – listing your property is completely free on our site.

A further point to note is to allow them to do the work if they are conducting viewings – A number of buyers will feel uncomfortable with a property owner in the house when they’re looking around.

5. Professional Photography

A few quick snaps on your phone will not suffice for a successful property listing.

Agents will usually have a preferred professional photographer contact, however you will not be obliged to use them.

An additional marketing tactic which is becoming more popular and important are video tours and floor plans – check with your photographer if they can produce a video tour and floor plan.

6. De-Clutter and Tidy Up

As stated above, buyers will decide if the property is for them within the initial 5 minutes of a viewing.

For this reason it is highly important that the interior and exterior of your property is completely tidy and free of clutter.

For the garden, you should consider hiring a gardener/landscaper if you are unsure on how to showcase a well maintained garden.

Do you have an untidy neighbor that lives up the street leaving old furniture in their garden/on the street?

Consider paying the few hundred £ to hire a skip to clean up the street – In a worst case scenario, a prospective buyer may decide your property is not for them before they even arrive at the viewing.

7. Redecorate

Does the interior / exterior of the property look slightly tired? A quick lick of paint could breathe fresh life into your house making it more appealing for potential buyers.

The same goes for anything inside the property which is broken – Door handles, torn furniture, faulty bulbs etc – ensuring the interior looks cared for will improve the chances of buyers converting.

However it is advised to not undertake drastic changes to the interior such as a complete remodel.

Small changes could consist of new lighting – if you are selling during the winter, a well lit wall lamp can make the property much more inviting, as will a wood burning fire.

8. Close Contacts

Consider asking friends, colleagues or family members if they know of anyone looking to purchase a house in the area.

You could also advertise in the local and regional newspapers – Some people do still browse the property listings in the papers!

9. Buyers Shoes

Look at the property as if you were a buyer.

What we mean by this is imagine walking into the property for the first time – what would you initial reaction be.

Does it look inviting?

Are there any personal items such as family portraits, gym equipment and children’s toys laying around? All of these items which you may think aren’t clutter could cause the property to look smaller.

10. Staging

If your agent recommends you are present during the viewings, stage the property as best as possible.

Ensure there are no lingering smells from the previous day’s dinner, everything is tidy, windows are cleaned, kitchen and bathrooms are spotless and all relevant lighting is switched on.

11. Neighborhood Information

Considering assembling various pieces of information regarding the surrounding area and neighborhood.

Points such as the local schools, best parks, restaurants, areas to avoid etc will be greatly appreciated by potential buyers.

12. Open House

If the area in which your property is located is in high demand, you could consider organizing an open house.

Not only will this attract prospective buyers, but there is also the possibility that two or more buyers become interested in the property and bid against each other – yielding a higher selling price.

Factors Which May Deter Potential Buyers

The points noted below should be avoided, as they could severely hinder your success in obtaining an interested buyer for your property.

• Non-professional photography
• Overvaluing the property
• Pets – Potential buyers may be put off by the presence of a pet
• Car in the driveway in images/when buyers come to view
• Untidy interior and/or exterior
• Hiding any weaknesses or damage in the property – If an interested party is near to completion but their surveyor finds out about the damage, they may back out of the deal, which in turn - - will waste your time.
• Political/market uncertainty – as explained below

Why Won't My House Sell?

Various factors can be affecting the sale of your property, which may be the reason you have received no leads.

As noted above, the average time to sell a house is around 2-4 months;

So rest assured, if your house has only been on the market for a few weeks, a buyer should come.

If not, consider talking to your agent about different approaches you could take in finding a buyer. Perhaps they would be willing to sell as a co-op with another agency.

Currently, one of the major factors which is affecting the property market is Brexit, especially in London.

Average prices in London have decreased and the number of completed sales has also decreased – Buyers are apprehensive to purchase in London due to the possibility of volatile house prices after Brexit, hence even the most attractive properties are receiving minimal leads.

Along the same lines, any political or global event can cause turbulence in the market, which will impact whether a buyers or sellers market is experienced.

Currently we are in a buyers market – demand is low and hence selling prices can be dealt lower and the time taken to sell a property increases.

Although house sales are slowing in various areas across the UK, British purchases of houses in France are in fact increasing – Perhaps many are anticipating a reduction in the value of GBP.

Considerations

Just because you are selling through a highstreet or online estate agent doesn’t necesarily mean you will have guaranteed success in selling your property. In some cases, properties are taken off of the market due to having absolutely no interested buyers.

Has your property been on a market for a while? You’re still yet to receive an interested buyer?

You may want to consider contacting a “fast house sale” company – These companies will offer to purchase your house, however usually significantly under the asking price.

Of course, this would ideally only be your fallback option.

If you have not yet contacted an agent to place your house on the market, you should consider whether the area is in high demand for buyers – if not, would it be possible to let the house out instead?

Can’t decide whether to sell through an agent or privately? These 12 reasons to sell through an agent may help you decide.

We hope these tips on selling your house have been beneficial to you. Feel free to share this article on social media so others can benefit from the points we covered!