In This Guide
choosing an agent
Conveyancing
Holding viewings
Negotiation
Planning your sale
Prepare your home
Seller's Packs
Selling at auction
Selling in Scotland
Selling privately
1. Sell your home privately
2. Valuing your property
3. Publicity
Selling your home
Using estate agents
Selling privately
Publicity
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More and more people each year are looking to bypass traditional estate agents from the sale process. As a result there are an increasing number of marketing opportunities for people looking to sell their home privately.
You will need to create your own publicity material in order to attract buyers for your property. Set yourself a budget and try to spread it across a range of activities to attract the broadest possible range of prospective buyers. If you are on a real shoestring, then you can do all sorts of things for free, but be prepared for things to take a little longer if you are unwilling to spend even a single penny.
Spread the word that you are looking to sell. It's amazing how
many properties get sold purely by word-of-mouth. Tell your neighbours,
tell your friends, your work colleagues and anyone else you can
think of. Many people would prefer to buy from someone that they
know given half the chance.
The Internet is fast becoming one of the favourite tools for anyone
looking to sell their home privately. You won't be surprised to
learn that we have devoted an entire section of SiteFinder to
more than 50 websites that allow you to sell your home without
an estate agent. Some of them allow you to sell your home for
free, whilst others charge various fees to advertise your property
details. By our reckoning, even if you submitted your property
details to all of the sites that charge you a fee, you will still
end up paying less than the equivalent of 2 percent commission
on a £100,000 house. The section of SiteFinder is called 'Sell
your home' and can be accessed using the link on the top left
of this page.
Posting notices in public places such as supermarkets, libraries,
shop windows, hospitals, schools, universities or large employers
and on other notice boards can be a cheap way of reaching people
who are looking in the area. All you have to pay for is the paper
and the ink from your printer. For safety's sake, it is advisable
to use a mobile number rather than your home phone if possible,
especially if you give details of the address or have a home that
is easily recognisable on a street.
There are a number of classified publications (such as Loot, Hot Property, Diamond free ads, Dalton's property etc) that allow free posting of property sale adverts from non-business customers. In addition, your local press will usually take adverts from members of the public for a fairly low cost.
Newspapers with a higher circulation can be quite a bit more expensive, so are only suitable if you have a bit more of a budget to spend. Advertising is usually charged per line of text, with the cost per line coming to anything from £3 to £15, depending on the circulation of the paper.
You can add the final touches to your marketing spree by having
a sign create a double-sided For Sale sign to stick in a prominent
place on your property. This should set you back around £50. If
you live in a leasehold property or in a conservation area, make
sure that this does not contravene your lease or any local by-laws,
as a fine in the magistrates court would be a cost and hassle
you could do without.
If you do a fantastic job of marketing your property, you will
be inundated with calls from desperate buyers. If this happens,
send us your CV and we may be able to find you work. Although
it's not likely that you'll need to open a call centre to handle
the flood of inquiries, you should make sure that you are available
to field them when they do come. Using a mobile number on your
advert can be a good idea. If not, then you should try to ensure
that your home phone has some kind of answer machine so that you
don't miss out on potential leads. One thing you will inevitably
have to deal with is a continued flow of calls from interested
parties even once the sale has been agreed and is in process.
You can stem this flow to some extent by removing all of the adverts
that you previously posted.
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