Author Archives: Sam

We live in the UK, which means that summer weather isn’t always sunny and hot – as much as we would love it to be! When you’re trying to sell, you want your home to look its best, and the rain can not only dampen your lawn, but your spirits as well. If you have buyers coming over and the weather is a little dim, you can still make the house look wonderful!

Light

Even during the day, darker skies can make it seem like evening. To get around this, light up the rooms. Make sure all of the blinds and curtains are open, and turn on all of your lamps including any cupboard and appliance lights. Doing so makes the home welcoming and bright.

Heat

Frustrating as it can be, during winter the temperatures can drop. If your home is a little chilly, turn the heat on low. You really want the temperature inside to be comfortable and want the buyers to stay, especially when the outside is cold.

Summer food

It’s always nice to offer snacks when buyers come round, and offering ‘summer’ snacks will keep buyers in the summer mind frame, rather than feeling that winter has returned. Fresh strawberries and lemonades are ideal.

Pictures

If the buyers are really interested in your home, they’re going to want to see the garden in its full glory. If the rain is pelting, bring out some umbrellas and take them outside for a small tour. Ideally have some great lifestyle pictures of your garden at hand too, to show why the garden is perfect in the sun!

If you’d like my help to sell your home more effectively, please answer a few short questions here and if I think I can help you, I’ll be in touch.

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The summer holidays are finally here, and many of you will be heading off for a week or two of relaxation! If you have your home for sale though, have you considered what will happen if people want to view it while you’re away? Some people feel fully confident leaving all viewings in the hands of their estate agents, whereas others prefer to be around for all viewings of their home. You obviously don’t want to lose potential buyers by not allowing views while you’re on holiday, so follow these tips below for pre-holiday preparations.

Bring in a friend – Your estate agent will always contact you to arrange any viewing, but let them know you’re on holiday and what your preferences are. If you want someone else to be there during a viewing, ask a friend or family member to be there too, and tell your agent this will be the case.

Keep in the loop – Despite lazing by the pool, you still want to be kept in the know while you’re away, especially if a viewing could lead to a sale. Ask your agent to drop you a call or email with any news or updates, and especially if interested parties are looking to make a second viewing.

Comments cards – Your estate agent will know the majority of your home details, but when it comes to particulars, you’re the best person to speak to. If you expect viewings when you’re on holiday, leave out little notes and comment cards on places and objects of interest. Potential buyers will appreciate the time taken and gesture, and may even help a sale.

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If you’d like my help to sell your home more effectively, please answer a few short questions here and if I think I can help you, I’ll be in touch.

When you first sign up with your estate agent, if they are doing a good job, you feel special. After all, they really wanted to be instructed to sell your house, perhaps against stiff competition, and so they almost certainly tried hard to impress you, and in all dealings to be courteous and professional.

However, when you receive an offer on your house, it invariably seems as though the agent’s allegiance has switched to the buyer. How can this be? You’re the one paying their commission! Something subtle has happened here, so let me try to explain.

Firstly, when the agent wants your business, ie the instruction to sell your house, he will charm and coax you until you sign on the dotted line. He’s won your business and he’s happy.

His next task is to find a buyer for your home, so now he’s winning business of a different kind. It’s the turn of your buyers to feel special and seduced, and his aim will be to keep them on track and so that they make an offer. When they eventually do make an offer, the agent’s focus is still on them, and not on you –his client – whilst he cajoles and persuades the buyer to raise their offer to a point at which you accept it. If there remains a gap between the two figures, he may well put some pressure on you to lower your expectations in line with your buyer’s offer.

In the US, this doesn’t happen, because each party has their own agent, ie a buying agent and a selling agent. These two agents negotiate between themselves, at their client’s instruction, so you never get the problem that we experience in the UK – that of an estate agent’s conflict of interest. At HomeTruths we believe that at such a crucial moment in their house sale, the seller needs impartial, honest advice, and that’s where we come in. Because we’re working for the seller, and only the seller.

A client of ours in Norfolk recently achieved £20,000 more than he expected simply because we gave him confidence in his asking price, so against huge pressure from his agent, (not selected by us, I hasten to add) he held out for the full asking price, and got it. Had he taken his agent’s advice, it would actually have cost him £50,000!

If your home is under offer, and you’re not sure you’re getting best advice from your agent, why not give me a call? Pick up the phone now – just think, five minutes on the phone could save you tens of thousands of pounds.

If you’d like my help to sell your home more effectively, please answer a few short questions here and if I think I can help you, I’ll be in touch.

Finally we’re seeing some signs of decent weather; the summer is upon us! With this in mind, this month’s theme is Selling your home in the summer. It is a great time to have your property on the market; people will be enjoying the beautiful weather and if you market your home right, it’ll attract dozens of buyers eager to find the perfect house.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll be discussing how to market your property right when this season is upon us, from staging your summertime garden to advertising your property at your local fête! You might also be wondering what happens when the rain comes; typically for the UK, we’re undoubtedly guaranteed some rain over the months of summer. One beautiful day can turn into a downpour on the following one! If you’ve got buyers coming over, you can still make your home look beautiful in overcast weather. Watch out for this and more.

The summer is the perfect time to take a look at your photography too; is your home advert still looking like winter or spring? Are a few autumn leaves lurking around the driveway? Refresh your photography and ensure that it makes your home shine in touch with the season!

If you’d like my help to sell your home more effectively, please answer a few short questions here and if I think I can help you, I’ll be in touch.

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If you’re on the hunt for a property at the same time as trying to sell, have you noticed that many listings on Rightmove don’t have named photographs? By named, we mean that a picture is simply referenced as ‘Picture 1’, instead of ‘Front of home’ and so on. Have you checked to see if your home for sale contains picture details, or is it the same as the many thousands that don’t? If yours is as humdrum as the other listings, talk to your agent today.

Why does it matter?

Buyer interest can increase dramatically if the rooms on the listing contain image details. If there are many photographs, and the potential buyer is trying to match up the photos to the floorplan and written description of your home, they could get very confused. Without names, they are simply looking at rooms and views. If a secondary property they are looking at is much more detailed and straightforward, their interest might drift away from yours very easily.

How can it be changed?

Many people will think that this is unchangeable, when it actually isn’t. It can’t be changed by you though, however. Your agent needs to do it. Rightmove allocates the title according to how the photograph is named on a computer desktop before uploading. By simply changing the title of the photograph before it is uploaded to the website, this is how it will show on Rightmove.

When should they be changed?

As soon as possible. Images are one of the best marketing tools available for you to sell your home, and if they aren’t named correctly you could be losing potential viewings and a faster sale.

Contact your agent today about your images on Rightmove, and ask if they can be changed to describe each room and view in your home. If you want buyers to fall in love with your home through pictures, show the pictures some love and give them a name!

If you’d like my help to sell your home more effectively, please answer a few short questions here and if I think I can help you, I’ll be in touch.

When you have buyers coming to view your home, questions are to be expected. With some, the estate agent will be able to real off the answer as they glance at their documents, but others will be more personal and in relation to your home.

With this in mind, we’ve put together some likely questions that may arise when potential buyers have a genuine interest in your house, and want to know a little bit more than the wallpaper colour…

Cupboard moseying – As well presented as your home might be when people come to take a look, how are your cupboards looking? While it may seem a peculiar place for people to take a look, some buyers like to scrutinise a home down to the last brick. Fixed cupboards, especially ones of the kitchen variety, offer a chance for people to suss out how they will display their bits and pieces. Taking this into consideration, don’t use the cupboards to store the mess you’re trying to hide while the lovely people are visiting; you might be left red faced when an over crammed cupboard spills out into the floor.

Cobwebs – By this, we don’t mean clean your home (it should be clean if you’re expecting company), but the houses past. If your house is quite an age, potential buyers might want to know about any odd particulars that have taken place. If your house has somewhat of a shady past (even if it didn’t bother you), buyers may want to know, and this could really swing a sale in a negative direction. An older house might also evoke questions about structural problems or anything untoward that causes a few hiccups with maintenance.

Nuisance Factors – While your viewers will want to picture their prospective home as the one of their dreams, they’ll still want to ask about any irritating aspects. Such examples might include traffic from nearby restaurants or shops, or sounds from motorways. These sort of sounds might be more clear at night. Other examples could include noisy pets, and even the politeness of the neighbours. As long as you’re truthful with your answer and don’t appear to be cleverly concocting a story, buyers will trust you.

Distances – The majority of your viewers will be local, but occasionally you might get some from outside of the area, looking to move in. In these instances, they’ll be interested in the area surrounding the house in regards to amenities. How close is the nearest shop, petrol station and railway station are commonly asked questions. If they have children, the distance to good and local schools will also be taken into account.

Be prepared for anything logical that might be asked when potential buyers come to view your home. You’ll be installing further confidence in their budding purchase and offer further promising selling points that make your home that little bit more special.

If you’d like my help to sell your home more effectively, please answer a few short questions here and if I think I can help you, I’ll be in touch.

In this day and age when there is a multitude of properties to choose from in estate agent windows and on property websites, a floorplan can really make or a break a decision to view a property. People like to see how a house is laid out, and a floorplan does this for them before they have even stepped in the door. Surprisingly though, floorplans are still overlooked by some sellers and agents, with some only being available on request. In other instances, floorplans are uploaded to a properties portfolio online, but can be too small to view or the zoom function doesn’t work. If this is the case, it might as well be hidden altogether.

So why are floorplans so important? Use our points below to assess how beneficial a floorplan would undoubtedly be when selling your home.

Size – A floorplan enables a buyer to see how big a place is. It is also useful to include measurements too, to ensure you’re providing accurate information. This can let someone assess where their furniture will fit, and how they could display everything in their new home. A floorplan doesn’t miss anything out, leaving no room for error or deception.

Usage – Buyers like to see how the house is laid out, and consequently if the layout will work for them. If parents desire their bedroom to be close to their children, a floorplan could make up their decision to make a viewing. Floorplans show the flow of how a house works. If it doesn’t work for someone, it isn’t worth wasting your time and theirs by coming to see it.

After a viewing – If someone does decide to come and view your property, a floorplan can be very useful afterwards to remember where everything was and to help a buyer further their decision. It is a helpful tool for discussion alongside images, for couples and families to talk about their potential future home.

If you’re selling your home, ensure that a floorplan is available to your viewers. Make sure that this is both available in the agent’s office, as well as online for download via any property websites that your agent may use. Talk to your agent to make sure it is clear and works correctly. It could just help sell your property!

If you’d like my help to sell your home more effectively, please answer a few short questions here and if I think I can help you, I’ll be in touch.

Social media such as Facebook and Twitter is on everyone’s lips nowadays, from university students using it to network with their classmates, to businesses sharing their latest venture or new creation. Networking with people – from your own town to those across the world – has become the norm. With this is mind, could social media marketing be used to sell your home? It’s being used in much more productive ways than simple friend connection, and with just a few simple guidelines, your home could be reaching your target audience within hours.

Here are our Top 5 Tips to sell your house effectively using social media:

Do your research – Have others done the same in your area? Have a search around your local area via social media, and see if you can find any success stories. Ask them questions, and learn any helpful facts about your area and its social media selling potential from those with experience.

Lay the foundations – Set up a social media page for your house via Facebook and Twitter. Both have advantages: Facebook is great for imagery, and Twitter is ideal for networking locally. Create a page you would want to look at if you were a buyer. Have a strong cover and profile photo of the property, and details of its location in the text boxes.

Sell it! – If you want to attract potential local buyers, ensure your images are spot on. A professional photographer would come in handy here. Get rid of clutter, and make each room look homely. Facebook has the advantage of videos too; why not get a video made? A showcase or walk-through of your home is an ideal way to let people see more of the property. Make your home sellable through quality creative content. Is it near good schools, for example? Tell them so.

Share it – Share your pages via your Facebook and Twitter accounts with your friends, and ask them to share it on to their friends too. This immediately opens your network. Do you have a blog or a website? Share it on here. Put it on the footer of your personal emails. Network on Twitter too; search for people looking for property in your area, and comment on their tweets.

Be interactive – You hopefully will start getting likes and comments from potential buyers; ensure you check the page daily to answer these, or risk losing prospective viewers.

One of our favourite examples of how successful social media selling can be, is a woman called Betsy Talbot who was setting off around the world with her husband, and wanted a quick sale. By networking and running the Twitter account to sound like the house was doing the talking, the house was sold within two months. One of our favourite lines: “I love watching you stroll by me on the way to Fremont Sunday Market. If you lived here you could park in my garage!”

In the next few years we could well see more properties being sold through social media. With such interesting developments in the property market happening all the time, it’s worth spending a little effort seeing if you can make it work for you.

If you’d like my help to sell your home more effectively, please answer a few short questions here and if I think I can help you, I’ll be in touch.

So many things are marketed as 99p or similar with an attempt to make it look ‘cheap’, when it really isn’t much of a saving. So how does this affect the many common things that ‘use’ the penny as a pricing tool?

When it comes to using the 1p pricing tool in property pricing, it tends to not have a very positive effect. Property pricing is of paramount important these days. I don’t mean the question of ‘value’ – but instead the art of setting the right price so that the portal searches are optimised. For example: you have a house to sell worth approximately £1 million. The agent suggests an asking price of £999,999. ”It’s a psychological price point” they tell you. I don’t agree. At all. I say – market at £1,000,000, and here’s why:

£999,999 is a cheap ploy – an ‘Asda’ price. Your buyers aren’t daft, so don’t treat them as if they are! Give them some respect and a ‘Harrods’ price. Make it £1 million straight;
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£1 million is actually an aspirational price point – your buyers WANT to spend one million pounds on a house, and tell their friends and family that they have done;
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£1 million is a very confident price – it says “my house is worth a million pounds” £999,999 is apologetic, humble: it says “make me an offer”;
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£1 million gets your property shown in more searches. At £999,999 on Rightmove, your property will only appear in searches up to £1 million. At £1,000,000 straight, it appears not only in searches up to £1 million, but also those over: potentially doubling traffic to your property advert.

After all, as my Dad would have said, “Look after the pennies, and the pounds will take care of themselves”.

Should we scrap the penny? Do you agree that it would have a positive effect for property pricing? Tell us below.

If you’d like my help to sell your home more effectively, please answer a few short questions here and if I think I can help you, I’ll be in touch.

Is your house on the market? Good. Go to Rightmove (www.rightmove.co.uk) and look up your property. Now click on each image in turn, and look at the titles, in the bottom right hand corner. What does it say? If the reference is, like 90% of the property photo references online, simply ‘Picture 1’ like below, or some other equally uninformative name, it needs changing.

Once the photo has been named properly, it will appear like this:

Why?

You may have a beautiful house, but if a buyer can’t correlate your images to say, your floorplan or written description, its impact may be lost. I came across a photograph of a stunning view only the other day on an online property advert, which I assumed was a nearby beauty spot. “Oh no”, the owner corrected me; “That’s the view from our patio!” So why on earth had the agent named the image ‘Pic 8’ instead of ‘View from patio’?! Your images are probably the most valuable marketing tool you have when you are selling your home, so use them to their best advantage.

How?

Ask your agent to do it! If he doesn’t know how, explain to him that he needs to rename all the images he has uploaded, then re-upload them to the property portals. That way they will appear with the names in the bottom right hand corner, as descriptions.

When?

Today! This is much too important to leave it even one more day, and as the property portals upload overnight, you need to make sure your agent addresses it urgently!

By the way, if you’d like more of Sam’s Selling Secrets delivered direct to your inbox, just pop your email address in here and I’ll do the rest.

If you’d like my help to sell your home more effectively, please answer a few short questions here and if I think I can help you, I’ll be in touch.