Suns out, buyers out

This year so far has been really tough, in fact the market in the first quarter has been as slow as I have known it for many years. It actually feels good getting it out there and not having to pretend everything is okay, almost therapeutic!

Last year was a record year. We did more of everything, sold more houses, brought more to the market and achieved the best sales prices ever. Like everyone, I presume, I thought this year would be more of the same but it has been anything but.  You have to look at the bigger picture to see exactly what is going on.

Like any market, the housing market is a fragile thing that relies heavily on consumer confidence. Last year there was an awful lot going on that should have affected the market more than it really did. Things like an election, interest rate rises, Brexit uncertainty, stamp duty and tax changes were happening nationally whilst locally there was proposed changes to school catchment areas and a flood of new build London Road flats coming to the market. All of these things should have affected the market in 2017 but didn’t at all, in fact the market rallied and things went haywire.

Maybe the lack of activity in 2018 is a hangover from last year? Being a typical salesman when things are going well I am on cloud 9 and when things aren’t going quite as well the whole world is about to end and I will be out of a job. I have genuinely been a bit worried, but I am now hopeful that things are going to turn around and might not be as bad as first suspected.

In my opinion the slow start that we have experienced in 2018 is to do with nothing more sinister than the weather. Yes, a bit of cold weather can actually have a huge impact to the whole housing market. We always have a quiet January after Christmas with people slow to get back to normality after the rigours of the festive period. Then the weather took a turn for the worse in February and we had a protracted and drawn out period of snow and disruptive weather which in turn led in to March and then in to the Easter holidays when basically everyone was fed up and had battened down the hatches and hibernated. The last thing that people were thinking about was buying a new home!

The last couple of weeks however have seen a mini heat wave and things have finally returned to a bit of normality. The broadway coffee shops have been full to capacity, the Old Town overflowing with revellers and estate agents moaning that they are run off their feet being too busy. We have had a brilliant April, we have always had plenty of properties on the market because people have always been keen to sell but we have finally been selling loads, with more viewings than ever and even selling lots of top end properties over £1,000,000 which is always a good indication of confidence returning to the market.

If you have a house on the market that you have been trying to sell for a few months then the trick is not to panic. There are actually quite a lot of properties currently on the market and this gives buyers a great deal of choice. It is not unusual for potential buyers to spend the weekend looking at 15, 20 or even more properties to find their perfect one and as there hasn’t been that many buyers out there so far in 2018 these guys can make offers and try their luck with cheeky offers to panicked vendors that think they are never going to sell.

If the market is returning to some form of normality we will see an influx of potential purchasers looking in earnest to secure their new homes. The high level of stock of properties to buy will dwindle as they are snapped up by purchasers, the power will return to vendors as is the norm in Leigh on Sea and they can be much more bullish when considering offers when demand outstrips supply as it normally does in Leigh.

If properties are struggling to sell the first thought from most estate agents is to reduce the asking prices. Normally this is quite right. As I have said before 9 times out of 10 the reason that properties do not sell in our area straight away is that they are too much money. There are normally buyers for everything in Leigh on Sea, regardless of size and condition so an adjustment in price can make all the difference in securing a sale.  It is important however to ensure that a price reduction has the required impact.

If your house is on the market for £800,000 dropping it by £5,000 is not really going to make that much of a difference. You also have to look at how people search for properties on line. There are different search criteria that people look at on rightmove especially. For instance, if your house is on the market for £325,000 dropping it by £10,000 might not actually have a great deal of impact as the next lowest price category on rightmove is £300,000 so it might not be seen by anybody new. As agents we do appreciate that these numbers are enormous. We do not take it lightly when we recommend people to reduce their asking prices by £25,000! What is important is to ensure that by dropping the price we will be able to manage to sell the property and this goes back to the market conditions. 

If you had been advised to drop your asking price in February during the snowy period because your property had been on the market since before Christmas then unfortunately, you probably wont have had a great deal of impact or interest since then and you may now have to consider a further reduction in your asking price. If however you have had your property on the market for a couple of months and have not had as much interest as you expected and are considering or being advised to drop your price then in my advice I would just hold fire. The market is returning to normality and we are seeing a great deal more interest than we have had for the first quarter of the year so just hold off for a couple of weeks to wait and see if things pick up. It still may be the case that you will have to adjust your asking price but by holding off a little bit longer might have a huge financial benefit to you.

This article is by Rob at Scott & Stapleton 
42 Broadway | Leigh-on-sea | Essex | SS9 1AJ
Tel: 01702 471155 
Email: rob@scottandstapleton.co.uk

To read all of Rob's previous property blogs, please click the link here