Choosing your estate agent
One of the first decisions is which estate agents will you speak to about selling your property. When arranging your valuations, here are a few key things to consider.
If you plan to sell your home, you might know where you want to move to and what your new home might look like. But, there are seemingly endless hurdles in the way of that dream—things you need to consider and decisions you need to make.
One of the first decisions is which estate agents will you speak to about selling your property. Most towns in the UK have between 6 and 10 estate agencies working within that location, so it isn't practical to arrange valuation appointments with all of them. The guidance is that you should have two or three, as this gives you a range of valuation figures to work out an average from and a variety of agents' presentations and strategies to listen to so that you can make a well-informed decision about your next course of action.
So, when arranging your valuations, here are a few key things to consider.
- Strategy - what is the agents' plan for marketing your property? Do they have a strategy in place that they use for all of their listings? Or do they come up with a bespoke marketing plan for your sale? Perhaps they have no particular strategy and will simply market the property on the portal websites, allowing buyers to get in touch with them. Discuss each agent's plan so you know if this aligns with your timescale and how you want your home to be represented.
At Christopher Stokes, we have a 30-day process for our property marketing which is then reviewed before making a plan with you for the next 30 days if the property is not sold. We leave nothing to chance.
- Innovation and technology. We live in the digital age, and so much technology is available to help sellers achieve a sale quickly and at the highest possible price. Find out what technology the agent uses and how this will help you. This is so much more than just social media posts and an essential factor in the property industry and will put you at a disadvantage if the agent is not using it.
- Contracts. What are the agents' contract terms like? Will they charge you an up-front fee or a withdrawal fee? Or are they confident they will be able to sell your home for you, so they only charge a fee at the point of a successful sale? This means the agent is paying for all marketing materials and production costs - they must be confident that they will get the sale and therefore get their costs back, right?!
If you want to meet our team of property professionals working together to sell your home, click here.