You’ve made the decision to sale your home. You’ve touched up the décor, polished from top to bottom, placed the kids in isolation, mowed the lawn to within an inch of its life, been out viewing property and set your sites on ‘the dream house’, appointed your estate agent, then…… NOTHING!

Follow these simple initiatives and you should soon be admiring the SOLD sign outside your door.

1 – Pricing

The longer your home sits on the market, the less likely it will attain the right interest with potential buyers. So what can you do to reinvigorate the process. Would a simple price reduction assist? Be aware that for Rightmove to consider your house ‘reduced’ then a reduction of at least 2% needs to be implemented. Anything less then that and the alerts do not go out to all those buyers sat waiting for their daily email from Rightmove advising them of new and reduced properties they may wish to purchase. Contrary to this advice, would a price INCREASE lift the exposure?  Say your home is being marketed at £499,500. Anyone searching for properties between £450,000 and £500,000 would be shown your home. Anyone looking between £500,000 and £550,000 would not. Price your home at a trigger point in the search options and the exposure will increase dramatically.

2 – Imagery

The old saying ‘you only get one chance to make a first impression’ is one to strictly adhere to when selling your home. Online ‘views’ can amount to the hundreds or sometimes thousands in the first few days of marketing. But for someone to ‘click through’ the page of properties they are scrolling through to see your particular house, the leading photos need to glow. If your home’s most appealing feature is the kitchen, garden, or anything else, then use this as the capture shot. All the following images need to be as good as possible and make sure your agent has employed a professional photographer. No matter how good the estate agent may be with a camera and no matter what they say, a professional photographer will do a much better job.

3 – The Description

Photo’s capture the interest, but a well written description will sale your home. I often see basic, paste and copy, non-engaging descriptions of properties being marketed, which would not reach out to the potential buyer and shout ‘buy me’. They should be written with the potential buyer in mind. Each property has it’s unique selling points and a good agent should have a fair idea the type of buyer who is likely to be interested. Write the description personally for them.

4 – The Viewing

Your agent should be accompanying all the viewings. Check your house is looking it’s best for the day of the viewing, open the curtains, put lights on as needed, check the heating is comfortable in the winter or open some windows in the summer if security allows, check any cooking or pet odours and deal with this, ask your neighbours to perhaps keep their pets inside for the time of the viewing, then take yourself, the pets, the children out. The agent should give you a guide as to how long they think a viewing will last, but this can often run over dependant on the interest shown. Ask your agent to text you when they have left the property so you can go back home.

If your home has been on the market for longer then you hoped, please get in touch and let’s see if we can get you moving.

Rob Pain @NEXA Bristol / 0117 3634411 / robpain@nexabristol.com