mate, that is a cracking house for 80 grand.

Yes.

3 bedroomed! people living in London must look on the north with great envy.

No.

Aberdeen house prices are pretty stupid and we’ve prepared ourselves. We have a 20K inheritance and we hope to get a 20K profit from this place.

If it were up to me, it’d be Aboyne, Banchory or Ballater.

But it’s nae

Perhaps this place does smell of tabs – come round and have a sniff.

If a house isn’t selling after a month or so it’s either

A) unusual
or
B) overpriced

This is probably B

Sorry Mr Smith. As you can probably tell, I’m in a bad way.

Sorry Mr Smith. As you can probably tell, I’m in a bad way.

no problem dude. 🙂
i would do a good clean of the paintwork though, is that discolouration on the walls in the kitchen above the units or just the photo? bit of elbow grease and sugar soap would sort that.

Anyway…seeing as you have a dog on the sofa, might be a bit doggy too!

So, if I was you I start room by room, stripping out everything I could and repainting the walls and woodwork. What have you got to lose? Nothing covers smells like fresh paint!

Crumbs. I’ve come across as a smoking, dog-owning, unpleasant alky.

Sounds about right but still, it’s a nice house.

We sold a place earlier this year and it really does come down to finding the right price, especially if you need a quick sale. Also at the cheaper end of the market people will often be stretching themselves when it comes to the mortgage so the more you can do to persuade them your house will need nothing done the better. Decluttering, tidying up paintwork etc. does work, and little things like making sure the house smells nice (although not so it’s obviously covering something up) are also good ideas (I make my own bread so tended to do that so the house smelled of fresh baked bread).

Looks fine to me . . . But then you should see our house!

Price is key in my opinion. And if it’s not selling, it’s probably a bit high.

Ours sold in a couple of days (literally) and we had to cancel 8 future viewings in the following days as we accepted an offer at full asking price.

Ours was easy to price though, as there were others on the street that had recently sold.

Edit_

Having said that, I can’t believe £80k is too much for a 3 bed house with a nice garden.
That half what our 2 bed (no garden) end terrace sold for in leeds.

if you didn’t appreciate MrSmiths house selling advice, I wont click the link and chip in

I don’t want to upset/annoy you and that’s very likely to happen – if you care, my general view/opinion/approach to house sales can be found via my forum history.

Ok, had a really good look at the listing and here’s what I have..

Kitchen
Ceiling looks stained
Kitchen is very dated, style of cupboards, glass display unit, non-integrated appliances, cheap too as it’s got older worktops with metal joints….
No dining space (yes there’s a table and chairs but no space to use them really as they are space saving type ones)
I can see damage to the worktops in the poor quality pic so in real life it probably looks worse.
As you walk into the front of the house its straight into the kitchen. A lot of people with families want a kitchen out back so mum can see the kids in the garden. Even if people don’t do that much nowadays its still what families look for.
It’s the FIRST room they see, they need to be impressed. Even if it’s an older kitchen you can do a lot to freshen it up. Remove some of the cupboards around the dining area end to make that area bigger, make it look good with fresh light coloured paint (use Dulux Timeless instead of PBW), repair the worktop, put new sealants in, maybe new door knobs.

Lounge
Wonky light fitting
Stairs in living room – does put a lot of people off.
Not a lot of space for furniture as the stairs and doors use up a lot of space – think about moving stuff around to make the best use of the space. Walking in through kitchen door into the back of chair won’t help. Bold wallpaper may be making the room look smaller than it is, its a bit dated now maybe? I was selling that wallpaper 9 years ago in the DIY store I worked in and fashions move fast.

Double bedroom.
Looks ok at first glance apart from being a bit pokey, but careful look at the pics shows scuffs and marks on the paintwork and paint on the window, just looks scruffy and uncared for.
Other rooms
Odd shapes and hard to see them working other than an office or a toddlers room – that bed looks small and I couldn’t see that a full single (if that one isn’t one) would fit in.

Bathroom
Looks ok actually….. but if the kitchen and lounge have put people off then the bathroom won’t rescue the viewing.

Garden
Best feature? Could be BUT the borders are overgrown, there’s a weird big conifer at the bottom hiding what appears to be a scruffy shed? Again, says not looked after. You appear to only get the view from upstairs so it isn’t something you can bank on. Perfect time of year to cut the grass, make some nice borders with a few bedding plants and get rid of anything that doesn’t make the grade.

Roof – looks older than neighbouring properties. Guttering looks wonky and different from neighbours too – older stuff?
Stuff around back door and blocked up door looks poor. Just render the concrete blocks area.

Wouldn’t cost more than £300-400 to completely transform how the house feels to a potential buyer. Probably less than that in reality but more time and effort required from you more than anything. There’s some stuff you can’t do anything about without spending massive amounts but make everything else look awesome so they can look past the negatives.

My house I sold (very similar to yours) I spent very little on before we sold it, just repainted rooms to brighten them up and get rid of bold colours we liked. We had an older kitchen worse than yours but I spruced it up for a few pounds to show that it would be ok to use for a while until they could afford a new one. Repainting out kitchen and putting a new blind in and tidying up made a huge difference.

Soobalias, I kind of hoped you’d chip in and if you look up, I did apologise to Mr Smith.

I have a viewing tonight at 6.30, a wall to sand and paint.

mate, that is a cracking house for 80 grand. 3 bedroomed! people living in London must look on the north with great envy.

About 10 years ago, I was briefly looking at a cottage (we call small houses cottages, makes people think of the countryside 😛 ) like that in St. Margarets (other side of river from Richmond).

It was £350k. I couldn’t afford it. It’s probably worth £1 million now.

ho hum.

Perfect time of year to cut the grass,

And leave the clippings inside for a day or two. Freshly mown grass is a perfect antidote to fag niffs. And it will smell of fags, even if it’s just your clothes.
Is the kitchen at the front? A good idea but many buyers won’t think so. They’ll think it’s odd. Explain the benefits.
As said, remove the OIEO from the price.
Ask your agent why they think it’s not selling. How long has it been on the market?

Been on the market since February 🙁

Off to buy a bottle of decent whisky and await the next viewing.

Perhaps my breath is putting them off?

I guess you will be looking to buy in or around Aberdeen?

Have you tried any developers to see if they with take your current house as part exchange against a new build?

Do people really make house buying decisions based on whether paintwork is a bit scuffed or not?

I think the house looks fine and nothing visible in the pictures would put me off. If you are buying a 3 bed house for £80k then you should expect to pick up a paintbrush.

Been on the market since February [/quot

Is it on Rightmove?
Change agent, trim the price a couple of k and be prepared to put of effort in, man!

Been on the market since February

It’s too expensive. The “offers over” bit puts people off as well. It’s not common in England and confuses people IMO.

Price it at 10% over what you want then take offers.

A house is only worth what someone is willing to pay.

I bet there are loads of cheaper houses in Shiney?

Have you tried any developers to see if they with take your current house as part exchange against a new build?

Avoid dandara if they do exchanges. Wife’s chum bought a property rooms were just over 760mm smaller in width that they were on plan. Took them to court and won.

Trade it in for a new build in Aberdeenshire? we simply couldn’t shift our place in Blyth but successfully dumped it on DWH for very little loss. A big developer like Barrat Group should have no issues in working nationaly.

p.s. I’m in Elba Park around the corner.

Oh and yes, Thomas Watson? Run away!

Do people really make house buying decisions based on whether paintwork is a bit scuffed or not?

it does seem so, yes!

I think the house looks fine and nothing visible in the pictures would put me off. If you are buying a 3 bed house for £80k then you should expect to pick up a paintbrush.

I agree, but on the basis of answering yes to the previous question, you’ve got to cover every avenue. Thing is user-r, if you’d spent the last month or two doing it up for say £500 cost, you’d probably have them queuing up to pay £80k for it.

Are other places selling locally?

Internal condition looks fine for the asking price, but if it’s not selling and other places are then you need to consider that it might be over the odds.

+1 for dropping the “offers over”, that’s clearly not gonna happen.

Who is showing round the potential buyers?
I am MUCH better at this than Mrs J (I’m a natural salesman bullshitter) and handled the viewings when we sold. Lots of positive energy, beaming smiles and answers ready for the inevitable questions.
Sold ours after the second viewing 😉
Good luck!

First off I can’t believe how cheap house are in the north and can’t believe salaries are half as much. In Bristol that the cheapest is £135K and nowhere near as nice. http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-67833449.html

To me the inside doesn’t look that bad at all. The front looks very drab and I would look at sprucing that up. Kerb appeal does make a massive difference. Also agree the blocked in back door isn’t nice, but not sure what can be done apart from cladding on rendering the lower back half.

Have a look on street view as there are some with hanging baskets and window boxes on your road and they look loads better. Cheap as chips to do that. Make it so they say wow just looking at it from the street. Also de clutter to get to the point where it is easy for you to tidy up quickly. Try and change your routine so you keep it tidy all the time.

First off, it took us 2.5 months to see our house in the NE, not too far from you. This is the photos from when we bought it. For some reason the photos from when we sold it aren’t online. The north east market is slow; so some people are used use to fast moving areas like the south, Leeds etc, advice is only partially relevant.

That said, there are things you can do to help sell the place, as detailed above. Houghton is a good location for transport links, so you need to appeal to the young, first time buyer who needs to commute to Durham and Newcastle. So that might require moving out the kids stuff etc.

Change agent – those photos really dont help! Why is half the floor missing in some of them with half the photo of the ceiling. The branches of YourMove are really good round your way – get one of them in to have a look at it and give you a quote. Also, you can see the quality of photos they took for ours.

Good luck – it is stupidly stressful!

Those developers PX schemes are not that great. They expect it to sell quickly (within a couple of weeks) and if it doesn’t they drop the price weekly till it does.

Been on the market since February

Then it’s too expensive, simple as.

Trampoline next door would put me off.
My priorities are location, off street parking & internet speed, but everyone is different.
I also cant believe how cheap houses are up north.

You need Kirsty Allsop to come round and give you a good telling off.

Who blocked up the rear door? Was it during your ownership?

I’d be questioning what other bizarre/cheap decisions have been made if that’s what the owners thought was a good solution.

18:30 – best of luck. You have two hours to present what you have in the best light, fresh air (don’t overdo the rattle can tho), plump cushions, clear every surface, (set the table!) get everything ready to pour your self a mug of coffee at 18:28

given the time of year and the bits ive seen that need doing…. consider pulling the house and fixing it up to re-market next spring.

its too late for the pics, which are not bad, but not perfect either.
the blocked up door, the garden fence, consider a redesign of the living space to make the dining table more obvious

Tbh, I’m pretty much past caring. Done the plastering, sanding and painting, going to get the blooming Hoover out soon.

Regards the blocked up back door, paint over the blockwork with some exterior paint,whack a bit of trellis either side of the window then get a couple of Honeysuckle or Clematis in some nice pots and train them to grow up the trellis.

Regards the interior it might be being marketed as a 3 bedder but the office and kids room look like one larger bedroom thats been chopped in half and to be honest it might be more saleable that way rather than 2 poky sized rooms.

Generally more bedrooms=more£ but not when the rooms are not really of a practical size.

past caring

about £80k

if you dont want it…

Good grief the agents website is dreadful. I just want to see the whole image, not ones with the bottom cropped off..
I am guessing that the agent is not making a packet out of this so probably not that motivated.
Take it off the market, spruce up and clear out as suggested.
Re-market with a new agent, fresh approach & better photos.

Houses that have been on for ages get a stigma, people see it as they trawl through Rightmove and think, oh thats been on for ages, must be something wrong with it, and instantly click on the next house..
Good luck.

PS. Any chance of letting it, for a year or two?

Lovely house on the inside , strange view on the back overlooking the rec, but unbelievably cheap, houses like that i work in regularly are getting 180,000 in chester

How do these two comments match up?

user-removed – Member
Taken a 6K hit already.

user-removed – Member
Aberdeen house prices are pretty stupid and we’ve prepared ourselves. We have a 20K inheritance and we hope to get a 20K profit from this place.

If you’d taken a 6k hit already you’d be marketing it at 6k less than you paid. It does sound like you can drop the price. It’s a stagnant property now, in the sense that it’s been on the market for so long that people don’t notice it when hunting, and those new buyers to the market view it with suspicion, wondering why nobody else has bought it.

If you stick it in at £75k fixed with a new agent I fancy your chances of joining your beloved ones before Christmas!

It seems there was an extension built in 1988… unless that’s not the address?
http://www.sunderland.gov.uk/online-applications/buildingControlDetails.do?previousCaseType=Property&previousKeyVal=002NH6BBLI000&activeTab=summary&previousCaseUprn=000045004656&previousCaseNumber=000YUQBBBU000&keyVal=8801164TYPE75

To be fair, 3 pages of STW is top internettage.

Not that I have the sense to do such a thing (I really don’t)