Anyone sold or bought a house privately?

[codlord]

Nothing to do with Surfs but I am putting my house on the market and although I will use an estate agent I also want to try selling it privately to try and save myself a few thousand pounds.

Anyone out there bought or sold privately before? Any advice? Success or horror stories? Can anyone recommend (or otherwise) any of the numerous private property buying/selling web sites out there (there seem to be loads but very few that look or seem any good).

Thanks in advance for any info...

[Fieldsy]

Hi ya m8, all i would say, is, go through an agent, we've sold quite a few houses over the last few years, and to be honest I wouldn't go private.

Everyone starts out trying to be honest and helpful, but things do start to get nasty if one individual in the chain is'nt going as fast as the others might like. You end up with numerous phone calls to your home address and even on your doorstep sometimes............all at times when you least don't want them............and everyone threatening to pull out.

We tried to go private on one deal when we were purchasing a property, the vendor had it up with an agent (we viewed it) and then he said would we like to go private so he could save some dosh...............no problem to us, but we ended up with numerous phone calls from him, and had them standing on our doorstep asking why we hadn't exchanged in just three weeks...................when our solicitor had informed us that their solicitor hadn't even sent draft contracts !!!!!

We informed the agent, what they were doing and they took over, because by law, we had viewed it through the agent, so they were entitled to the commission, and in the end they had to pay the agent.

I do agree that estate agents get money for old rope, but if theres any probs, ring them and give them the flack, let them sort out the chain, let them find out what everyones solicitors are doing.They get enough money for doing it so let them do the work.

We have one agent locally to us who is an exception, kept us informed at all times, even rang the mortgage company of the guy who was buying our house to find out what the ****** hell was going on, and would definately use him again......(and we will be soon).

At the end of the day m8y its up to you, but you do have a bit of comeback and advice from the agent if they've introduced the seller.

Just remember one thing, you can have everything running smoothly your end, returning documents, replying to letters etc....., but everyone in the chain only works as fast as the SLOWEST SOLICITOR !!!!!

Good luck m8..................and no I'm not an estate agent

Fieldsy

[da SLUG man]

yeah, go through an agent...

moving day especially, you won't have time to do everything... all you'll need to do is pack up, drop keys at agent, then wait for solicitors to finish playing golf and the other agent will come and drop off keys... done...

otherwise you'll be driving around all afternoon and not be able to oversee the stuf going on at home.

never had one that hasn't gone through yet... closest i've got was 5:30pm!!...

[boxertwin]

Nothing to do with Surfs but I am putting my house on the market and although I will use an estate agent I also want to try selling it privately to try and save myself a few thousand pounds.

Anyone out there bought or sold privately before? Any advice? Success or horror stories? Can anyone recommend (or otherwise) any of the numerous private property buying/selling web sites out there (there seem to be loads but very few that look or seem any good).

Thanks in advance for any info...

I sold a house about seven years ago through LOOT. Cost about £120ish if I remember. This paid for the ad and the sign outside the house. I thought it was worth a bash. Saved quite a bit on agents fees.

Phil

[Linda]

We're selling the Stevenage house privately if at all possible.

My every contact with estate agents has been hell, with them being very unhelpful, very nosey, and totally failing to do what they said when they said. T last lot of estate agents I used wouldnt even do the key exchange! They did nothing to earn the commission and called me constantly about silly details (instead of the solicitor who had the answers) and were never available or returned my calls when I wanted to get hold of them. Never ever again if I can help it. When we bought the current house we ended up dealing with the vendors directly on almost everything as the agent were so useless and unhelpful. We got things done a lot quicker that way.

[marky]

We're selling the Stevenage house privately if at all possible.

My every contact with estate agents has been hell, with them being very unhelpful, very nosey, and totally failing to do what they said when they said. T last lot of estate agents I used wouldnt even do the key exchange! They did nothing to earn the commission and called me constantly about silly details (instead of the solicitor who had the answers) and were never available or returned my calls when I wanted to get hold of them. Never ever again if I can help it. When we bought the current house we ended up dealing with the vendors directly on almost everything as the agent were so useless and unhelpful. We got things done a lot quicker that way.

They lie as well. When we bought this house we were in contact with both sides all the time & the amount of bull that came from the Estate Agents was CRIMINAL.

[Linda]

They lie as well. When we bought this house we were in contact with both sides all the time & the amount of bull that came from the Estate Agents was CRIMINAL.

Oh too right.... the things I was told that were just totally made up was criminal.

[codlord]

Well, as I said I am still gonna use an estate agent (had one round today who seemed o.k. and is asking 1.75% commission) but I have been searching around on private selling web sites and have found:

http://www.houseladder.co.uk/ - Basic ad for free, but to get contact from potential buyers requires a payment/proper registration from £49.

http://www.homesonsale.co.uk/ - Currently an offer so totally free for full ad and looks like a decent site too, normal ad is something like £25.

http://www.houseweb.co.uk/ - Range of options from £49 to £300

Compared with my £160,000ish house at 1.75% commission = £2800 + VAT! = £3290! Would anyone use autotrader and the like if they charged those sorts of percentages to sell your car? - I don't think so. These days when the web is used primarily for advertising the houses anyway it does seem a lot of money to have to pay. On top of all the chuffing fees - survey fee, conveyancing fee, land registry fee, mortgage repayment fee, deed release fee, early repayment fees, new mortgage fees - jesus christ this moving lark is not cheap!!!

[Fieldsy]

Yep, I agree with Lindas comments, they lie through their back teeth !!!, and usually you see through their lies either from the solicitor or the vendor. We have had this in the past, by one of the biggest in our area Bairstow & Eves, but to be fair, we now use a local agent on all our sales and they are brilliant, keep us informed of everything and try to help us in any way they can, so much so that we reccommend them to others. We just might be lucky !!!, as I'm sure others are less helpful.

One other thing m8, get that commision down!!!!!, thats way toooo high, we've sold the last two at 1%, and most only charge 2% for multi agent, so you're only .25% less than that. Just play one against the other and get it down.

good luck again !!

Fieldsy