Estate Agents (*spit*)

[chock]

yeah well at least I dont spend my weekends in PCWorld ! Looooooser !

come on chap, you used that one about three times yesterday.........

[Jesus]

On say a £500K house (average contractor house) that's still £5K for a few photos a floorplan and a side of A4.

Surely there's a cheaper way to sell your house these days?

sell it yourself on the web, from £50.

Put it on right move and asserta home from £100.

[DimPrawn]

sell it yourself on the web, from £50.

Put it on right move and asserta home from £100.

I did that a while back. The level of interest is much lower and you get all sorts of muppets who clearly are not in any position to buy wasting your time.

It's the age old argument of what value do agents give in any business. One value add they give is filtering out the riff-raff and time wasters (generally) and in helping make the buy decision (by talking up the market and generally bulltulipting the level of interest in the property).

Try the Internet only route by all means but my experience of it is it still needs humans chasing people, doing the sales pitch and putting a bit of pressure on the prospective buyers.

You can try doing this yourself but it doesn't come across in the same way as an 3rd party (agent) doing it.

[Bagpuss]

I did that a while back. The level of interest is much lower and you get all sorts of muppets who clearly are not in any position to buy wasting your time.

It's the age old argument of what value do agents give in any business. One value add they give is filtering out the riff-raff and time wasters (generally) and in helping make the buy decision (by talking up the market and generally bulltulipting the level of interest in the property).

Try the Internet only route by all means but my experience of it is it still needs humans chasing people, doing the sales pitch and putting a bit of pressure on the prospective buyers.

You can try doing this yourself but it doesn't come across in the same way as an 3rd party (agent) doing it.

Bollocks, I sold my house within 3 weeks of using a property website (<£100)

The agents wanted thousands for running an ad in the paper once every 3 or 4 weeks. They sent around loads of timewasters and even tried to con me into selling to a property developer for cut down money. You do not need agents for selling a house, they do feck all, just walk into any estate agents and you will see how hard they work!!!

[DimPrawn]

Talking of agents, where's Dodgy Agent these days?

[bogeyman]

Talking of agents, where's Dodgy Agent these days?

I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti

[oraclesmith]

Bollocks, I sold my house within 3 weeks of using a property website (<£100)

The agents wanted thousands for running an ad in the paper once every 3 or 4 weeks. They sent around loads of timewasters and even tried to con me into selling to a property developer for cut down money. You do not need agents for selling a house, they do feck all, just walk into any estate agents and you will see how hard they work!!!

If you have a hot property then it makes it easier. You can supplement the Internet option by putting some sales effort in yourself - eg. for sale boards, flyers for newsagent windows, newspaper ads, make up some flash brochures/particulars to send to prospective buyers, be on hand to show people round (and know how to do it), follow up each lead properly. Although this can sometimes cost money, it's nothing compared to how much your house costs and how much you save on agents fees.

[Goya]

Just sold my drum (subject to contract) for 1% commission. Had a few agents round & they ranged from 1-1.5%.

[Pinto]

If you have a hot property then it makes it easier. You can supplement the Internet option by putting some sales effort in yourself - eg. for sale boards, flyers for newsagent windows, newspaper ads, make up some flash brochures/particulars to send to prospective buyers, be on hand to show people round (and know how to do it), follow up each lead properly. Although this can sometimes cost money, it's nothing compared to how much your house costs and how much you save on agents fees.

How do you price the house? Would you use the estate agents for that?
Last time I had my house valued, there was a difference of 150K between just four agents.

[Bagpuss]

How do you price the house? Would you use the estate agents for that?
Last time I had my house valued, there was a difference of 150K between just four agents.

You can use the agents or use a valuation website (half the time its all they do anyway).

There is no need for agents to sell houses, most people nowadays search 1 or 2 websites for houses and then are directed to an agent. All the agent does is take your money and slow down the conveyencing process.

You still end up showing the vast majority of people around!

Your agents shop, might get some local people interested, but is that worth 1,000? I doubt it