Before you go ahead and put your property on the market, it is important to understand what your motivation is for selling your home. This will help you further down the buying and selling process when you are looking for a property, or deciding whether to accept an offer.
There are many reasons why you may be looking to sell your property, here are some of the more common reasons:-
We recommend you write a list of your top priorities of why you want to sell. This will help keep you focused throughout the selling process. For example “We are moving because we need another bedroom, more space and we would also like a cleaner environment”. By doing this it will ensure that you do not get seduced by the wrong property and lose sight of your real reasons for moving home.
Typically the busiest time in the UK housing market is in Spring, from late March onwards. This is when the majority of property transactions take place. The reasons for this are that days are longer, the weather is nicer and properties look better. There is nothing worse than moving into a property or viewing properties on cold, rainy, dark days. Would you like to be moving in your furniture and sorting out the logistics of a move into new house on a cold dark and wet December day?
Property transactions tend to slow down in autumn and virtually grind to a halt in December as people like to be settled in a home by Christmas and do not want the hassle of moving then. The market then picks up in January, with transactions peaking in the summer months.
How long it will take to sell your property will obviously depend on the market. Low interest rates, a large number of first time buyers and rising house prices all tend to equal a buoyant housing market. The opposite factors create a slow market. A market can be slow for a number of reasons. In the current climate there are predictions of stagnation as prices virtually level out for the next few years. Go to our house price news channel to keep up to date with the current property market.
Even in a buoyant market your property may be slow to sell for a number of reasons such as:-
In general a house should sell after about 10-20 viewings (the latter end of the scale in a slower market). From start to finish of an offer being accepted the selling process can take anywhere from 2 months to much longer depending on whether you are in a chain or not.
This is very tough to answer. Basically most transactions happen on the same day, so that there is no downtime between selling your property and moving into another. However the downside of this system is that it causes chains. A property chain is simply just that, a chain of of buyers and sellers that are all interdependent on one another. This can be a logistical nightmare and if one party gets cold feet and pulls out then quite simply the whole chain can collapse causing stress, delays, the loss of the property you wanted to purchase and a loss of money.
As a general rule do not sell a property unless you have found a new property to move in to. The alternative options are that perhaps you could rent for a short while after you have sold your house. This gives you longer to find your dream property. This is becoming increasingly popular particular in a housing market that is not rising and is stagnant (like we are at the moment). People do this because it can be cheaper to rent and they can free up their equity in the property and get a better return on an investment elsewhere e.g. savings, shares etc. This is called selling to rent. In addition when they do come to buy a property, they will be in a stronger position as they can speed up the property transaction as they are not in a chain. This makes them attractive to vendors.
However it is can be disruptive moving home twice and there are associated costs of mortgage arrangement fees and removal costs. It can also be risky if the property market begins to rise.
When looking at when to sell and buy, it makes sense to understand what market you are in. For example if you are in a boom period then it makes perfect sense to put in an offer on a property first and then aim to sell your house afterwards. You could end up benefiting from price rises over the months in between making an offer on your new property and accepting an offer on your current property. However you run the risk of losing your new home sales if the process takes to long.
