Author Archives: Sam

This guest post is brought to you by Alex Sebuliba on behalf of Martin & Co.

Martin & Co are a UK based national Lettings agency who offer service to tenants, landlords, sellers, buyers and investors. With over 25 years of experience, they specialise in ensuring the specific demands and requirements of every individual are met at all times.

While many home owners have decided to sit tight while the financial crisis rumbles on despite a desire to move, those who do decide to go ahead and try to sell their property have a decision to make – sell privately, or go through an estate agent?

For many people, it’s a question they’ve not even pondered, handing over the power – and plenty of money – to their local estate agent in a bid to help them sell. But the reality is quite different, and in the last few years a growing number of people have chosen to sell their own property. So which is best?

Estate agents

Using an estate agent remains by far the most common way to sell a property. When I sold my home, I visited a plethora of estate agents in Newark, who all vowed to do their best by me, to take the stress off me and to achieve the goal of selling my home for the best possible price.

But their services came at a cost. All wanted a minimum of 1.5%, plus VAT, as a fee. The average UK house price is now £238,000, meaning estate agent fees total almost £4,000 before VAT is added.

However, if you choose to sell through an agent, you know they want to sell your property – and so they will do their best to get viewers and to make a sale. This is, surely, exactly what you want from them, after all it is their job.

Selling privately

With the rise of the internet and a change in the rules on buying and selling property online, it’s now easier than ever to sell your house yourself, and the fees that come with it could be a lot less – sometimes as little as £175 to list your property for sale.

However, this cost will likely rise if your house doesn’t sell quickly depending on the type of independent selling process you use; some websites allow a one-off fee to

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.

It’s Friday and the last in my mini-series of learning from Andy Murray to help you sell your house!

However on top of their game Andy is, if he wants to stay there, he knows he has to defer to his coach for advice and, well, coaching! He has to put his total trust and faith in Ivan Lendl, and believe whole-heartedly that he has Andy’s success at heart, wanting the win as much as the player themselves do. It must sometimes take a lot of courage and ability to overcome his own misgivings in following advice that might seem counter-intuitive, but he knows that without this faith, Andy would be on his own and success would almost certainly evade him.

If you’re trying to sell your home and it’s just not going very well – perhaps you’re suffering from a lack of viewings, and maybe you’re trying your best to resist pressure from your agent to reduce your asking price – you may be wondering what on earth you can do. That’s where HomeTruths comes in. think of us as your personal property coach! We ask you to put your trust and faith in us, and in return we will advise and coach you through what can be a very difficult and emotionally-trying time. We’ll be there for the inevitable ups and downs, to tell you what to do when the feedback is less than flattering, or when you get a very low offer. We will do everything we can to get you a sale at the price you want. Sometimes, as I’m sure happens from time to time between Ivan and Andy, you might think we are wrong, that our advice is counter-intuitive, but stick with us, and keep the faith, and together, we’ll get you moving!

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.

Fourth in my five-part series with the shamelessly contrived theme of Wimbledon!

Andy Murray is exceptionally competitive. To him, winning is everything. Coming second is no consolation – it just means not winning. He needs this competitive edge, this determination to win, in order to achieve success. He has to want it enough. Not only this, but he has to know his competitor’s game as well as they know their own. Only by completely understanding the nuances, strengths and weaknesses of Djokovic’s game could Andy hope to beat him by being better, stronger and more creative.

How well do you know your competition? Do you know what else someone looking in your price bracket can buy? You need to know what other homes are on the market that in any way could be your competition. Look at their price in great detail, for example, what is their price per square foot, and how does that compare to yours? What features are they offering? Is your conservatory equal in value and desirability to their pool? Does your garden compete well against their paddock?

It’s difficult for a buyer to compare non-exact features such as these, as it’s like comparing apples with pears. However, compare the houses is exactly what they will do, and they will make a balanced decision on which offers the better value, and the most house for their money. Thus a young family will often choose a home with new fixtures and fittings over one with more space, but dated fittings; an older couple may well decide a home with two bedrooms and more character has more to offer them than a modern four bedroomed home on an estate. Consider carefully what your most likely buyer will look for, and give it to them. And give it to them in spades. Just like the tennis players, your game needs to be better, stronger and more creative, then you’ll beat the competition hands down. Just like Andy did.

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.

Welcome to Wednesday and the third in my series themed on Wimbledon.

In his book, Adapt – Why Success Always Starts With Failure – Tim Harford explains we must adapt—improvise rather than plan, work from the bottom up rather than the top down, and take baby steps rather than great leaps forward, in order to achieve success. Thus our great tennis players are constantly adapting in order to improve their games, often one tiny step at a time. Only by losing a point or a game can they re-evaluate, review, adapt and apply a new technique. In other words, without failure, there can be no success.

If your house is languishing on the market, with no viewers in sight, it is very easy to become disheartened and disillusioned with the entire selling process. It certainly isn’t often easy, especially when you are selling a unique home. Maureen O’Hara once said, “To cope, people need to be certain enough to act and uncertain enough to learn”, in other words, to have the courage of your convictions whilst still being humble enough to accept you may need advice and help. Not an easy conflict to deal with.

If you don’t have any viewings, review your marketing, and make some small changes to effect overall large improvements; if you have plenty of viewings but no offers, critique your home; maybe commission a professional home stager. If you are getting offers but they are below your target sale price, read up on negotiation skills, or even engage a professional homebuyer to negotiate on your behalf. In short – raise your game, and adapt, adapt, adapt.

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.

Day 2 of my series celebrating Andy Murray’s fantastic win and hopefully, the sale of your home!

Andy Murray and the rest of the world’s elite tennis players really are creative in their game. They innovate continually, coming up with new moves, slices, serves and techniques in a constant effort to improve their game.

When you are selling your home, creativity is key. Your marketing needs to stand out from those of your competitors, and at HomeTruths we are constantly looking at ways in which our clients’ marketing can be more innovative. Your brochure, online advert and property photography all need to be exceptional, so look at it with an extremely critical eye, and ask yourself “what could we do better?” Our photographers strive to create new angles and exciting lighting; the brochures we advocate are very special, with unusual formats, lots of pages, and creative layouts. Only by innovating on a continuous basis, questioning and reviewing your marketing, can you ensure that your home really sells itself.

Once a buyer takes the plunge and books a viewing on your home, you need to be absolutely certain that it really delivers the wow factor in every way possible. No matter how ordinary your home, or how modest its proportions, every room needs to really shine to a buyer. In order to be innovative and creative, visit show homes, stately homes and interior design showrooms; gather ideas and tips voraciously and apply the best and most appropriate ones in your home. It may be a splash of colour, a stylish piece of artwork or a sumptuous rug; whatever it takes to really grab your buyer and reassure them that this is their dream home.

Tomorrow we’re going to look at how to adapt to sell your property faster, and for more.

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.

Well done Andy!! I think I speak for the entire nation when I say that I was very proud of our ‘grumpy Scot’ yesterday. I think my whole village heard my shouts of delight when that ball went in the net and the trophy was ours after 77 years!

So as a tribute to our success, I decided to write a series of 5 posts with Wimbledon as a theme for the HomeTruths’ blog! Not such a contrived proposition as you might first think! Today’s post is all about:

Determination

To be seeded in tennis, the levels of determination required are intense. Practice, review, and practice again; repeat ad infinitum. It’s this persistence and tenacity that really sets apart the professional sportsperson and without it, they cannot hope to achieve success.

When you are selling your home, you need to display a dogged persistence in the face of adversity. Viewers will fail to show up, agents won’t call you back, lots of people will make negative comments about your lovely home, and throughout it all, you have to rise above it, and carry on regardless, and try to keep a smile on your face besides. Only by picking yourself up and still making sure your property is looking at its very best for each and every viewing can you, in turn, hope to achieve success. Many sellers fall by the wayside: statistically less than half of sellers actually sell their homes through their original agent, and over 15% just give up. It takes determination, perseverance, and a certain amount of stubbornness to stick to your asking price, and keep your chin up, but if you do this, eventually you will sell!

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.

Just seconds into a first meeting we form an impression of people based on their appearance and how they’re dressed, and it’s much the same with the first sight of a front garden.

If you’re selling your house the prospective buyer will quickly form an opinion of what the inside of the house is like, based on the appearance of the front garden and entrance to the house.

Try to imagine what the house looks like to a first-time visitor, take a photo from the entrance and see what this reveals. These simple steps will help to create a smart, stylish exterior:

• Clear any old leaves and debris, sweep paths, clean windows

• Move any dustbins or recycling boxes out of sight

• Remove any flower pots with dead or unattractive plants

• Replace collections of numerous small plant pots with few larger ones

• Use plant pots of similar material, type and colour

• If there is any grass, cut it and trim the edges

• Cut hedges

• Fill containers with single colour (much smarter than mixed colours) bedding- plants for a quick fix. Match the flower colour to the paintwork of the house, or choose a contrasting colour.

• Use light eg white or pale yellow flowers, to bounce some light into shady areas.

• Invest in some smart lollipop-shaped topiary shrubs to place either side of the entrance, and as long as you remember to tell your buyer that they’re not included in the sale, you can take them with you.

Then just sit back and wait for the compliments!

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.

One of the things that is guaranteed to be a ‘put-off’ to potential buyers when it comes to selling your house, is clutter.

Clutter tends to fall into three distinct categories when you’re selling; the first of which I like to call your ‘Cherished Clutter’ – you know, the kind of stuff that you think looks wonderful, but your buyers think would be better placed in a box in the garage!

What I’m talking about here is all the lovely nic-nacs you might have collected over the years, walls full of photographs, trinkets, candle-sticks, keepsakes and all the other bits of stuff that clutter up your surfaces collecting dust, helping to make your rooms look & feel smaller, stagnating the energy and distracting your buyers from the real assets that your home has to offer.

My 10 Step Guide applies just as much to that kind of clutter as it does the more obvious kind – the kind that creeps into your home, takes hold, reproduces and expands in the blink of an eye – often without you noticing until it’s become more of an issue. This I call your ‘Creeping Clutter’ – and will equally put your buyers off, in a similar proportion to which it is present. The reality is that the more clutter you have, the less likely buyers will be impressed.

Thirdly, and probably most important, is your ‘Mind Clutter’ – all the different aspects of preparing to sell your house that are vying for your attention, and can often leave your brain feeling like ‘mush’ because there’s so much to consider.

So where do you start? Follow my 10 Step Guide to Clutter Free Selling to achieve a tidy, organised home (and mind!) that will impress your buyers and have the offers rolling in;

Decide on a clear outcome – if you want to sell, the starting point is that you fully make that commitment, and immerse yourself into being a ‘home- seller’, rather than a ‘home-owner’.
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Detach yourself emotionally from your house – sometimes easier said than done, but an absolutely essential step towards selling up and moving on.
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Decide on your ideal timescale – when do you want to have sold by? There’s no magic wand, but setting a date keeps you focused.
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Identify your buyer – be as specific as possible, who exactly is your home perfect for? And how would they be living there?
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Walk around your home with ‘fresh’ eyes – see what your potential buyer would see. Are there any ‘trouble spots’ that could put them off? Does your home reflect how they would live?
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Set your budget – very few of us live in a house that is ‘show home’ standard all of the time. So be realistic – chances are, you’ll need to spend something to bring it up to scratch.
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Give yourself some time & space to think & plan – once you’ve followed the previous 6 Steps, you’ll have a much clearer idea of what you need to do.
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Write things down. If everything is spinning around in your head, that’s not the best way to get some clarity and direction. Externalising & writing things down helps you focus, keep perspective and stay grounded.
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Break down each item into bite size chunks, prioritise the order of completion and buy anything you need.
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Tackle each chunk one step at a time – whether that’s decluttering, organising or home staging – and if you need some additional help, support or expertise, think about using the services of a Professional Organiser & Home Stager.

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.

Julie Stevens of Younique Designs Ltd is a professional Home Stager.

If you have been trying to sell your home for some months and possibly even had a sale fall through you could find yourself broken hearted, demotivated and lost of all inspiration of what to do next. You may have lost sight of why you wanted to sell in the first place.

My advice to my clients who find themselves in this situation is the following:

Firstly, Reflect back to your decision to sell – was it a half-hearted thought? Maybe you saw the perfect next home for you. Did you think, ‘lets just put it on the market and see what happens’? Was it pressure from family members who think its time you moved into something smaller and more manageable? Whatever the reasons for your decision were, were you really committed to it?
Reassess where you are now. What has happened? How has the marketing strategy of your agent been implemented? How many viewings have you had? Have your photographs been refreshed on line? Do you have a brochure that represents your property well? How many price drops have you been through?
Ask yourself afresh why you want to sell. If you have a clear answer on this then you can move forward. Understand what your desires are, how you want to feel when you sell and move into your new home.
Understand that you have to be motivated to action in order to achieve those desired feelings.
Start afresh with new eyes to see the home you have for sale.
Realise that your home is a product to be sold – as such it has to be packaged and marketed in the right way to appeal to the right buyers. It has to stand out from the crowd; it has to have the right features and benefits to meet the aspirations of your potential buyers.
Take the advice of a professional Home Stager to see if your home is presented and packaged in the right way for your target buyers. A Home Stager will understand the aspirations of buyers and know what they want to see when looking for their new home.
Put yourself in your buyer’s shoes – what do you see?
As a buyer yourself for your new home – what do you want to see? How does this differ from what you have to sell?
Write down what you did

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.

This month we’ve been looking at how to market your home towards females, and this week we’re specifically focusing on Guerrilla marketing. Some of our favourite examples from around the world include the US brand Target, who found an interactive way to advertise its new home decor line by displaying the products within a life-size dollhouse in the middle of New York’s Grand Central train station, and inviting visitors to step inside. Our second favourite is Ikea turning a subway train in Japan into a living room.

We’re not expecting you to turn your local bus or train into the interior of your living room, but these ideas show that doing something different really works. How can you apply this to marketing to females? We’ve put together some simple, cheap and effective guerrilla marketing ideas:

Car boot – Want to get rid of some stuff before you move? Set up a stall at a car boot sale, and allow half of the table to advertise your home. It can be a poster, a tv with a video constantly playing or a pin board covered in images. Make it stand out and look like something different to attract interested parties. Have a link to your estate agents website, or use a QR code to directly link from peoples phones.

YouTube – YouTube has millions of views daily, and if you rustle up something original it is bound to be seen. A man made the news in 2012 for creating a video about his home to try and sell it, which included a quirky song and some light humour. We’re not suggesting you create a single, but his efforts paid off. Take your viewers on an amateur tour of your home, and show them what makes it special. Get friends to share it on social media, and the love will spread!

An advert with a difference – You know those adverts you see in shop windows, where you can tear off a bottom section for contact details? Do this, but with a difference. Create an image of your home, whether a photograph or a drawing, add some details, and add tear-off contact details below. Cut it out as a house shape, and ask to place it in a few local places where females will notice it. Its creativity will turn heads.

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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.