The number one question people ask when looking at ways to sell their property is – ‘is it worth selling my house quickly?’
Now this is a difficult question to answer because everyone’s situation is different but we can try and help with some general points that we’ve split into the strategy and the money.
The Strategy of selling your house
So it might seem a bit odd talking about the strategy of selling your house but the canniest sellers know that a good selling strategy makes all the difference.
The first thing you need to think about is what outcome you want to achieve.
For example is it your aim just to get the most money out of the sale you can? Or maybe you just want to free yourself from debt?
Whatever your aim is will dictate the sort of strategy you want when thinking about moving.
So let’s imagine that you have seen your absolute dream house and your aim is to buy it.
You visit and it is everything you expect it to be but there’s just one snag – the buyer wants out really quick so they are giving priority (and a decent discount) to people who can make a cash offer, or at least where they think they can complete quickly.
So you can go ahead and market your property and hope for the best, or you can get a bridging loan (expensive) and hope for the best or you can go for a quick property sale which will give the confidence to the seller that you are serious and will get you that hefty discount!
A quick property sale isn't just for buyers
Selling your house quickly isn’t just for people who are buying another house though.
One of the things we are seeing more and more is where people are moving into sheltered accommodation or care homes.
In these cases a quick sale does one of two things; it means that they can get access quickly to cash to pay fees and the cost of moving in but also it gives them peace of mind that they don’t have to worry about the whole sale process for an extended period of time, after all quick property sales with Lothian can take as little as ten days.
The money
There’s a trade off between selling quickly and waiting a longer time for full price.
Now we know that selling your house isn’t all about money but we do need to look at the basic economics of a so called ‘normal’ sale compared to a quick sale through Lothian.
There’s an old saying – ‘time is money’ and in terms of property this is absolutely true.
The longer your sale process goes on the more it costs you, so whilst the ticket price on your property might look attractive, once you have paid all the fees and the extra mortgage payments it suddenly doesn’t look that good!
Here’s the comparison
Selling your house: Traditional Vs Quick sale
Traditional sale
| House price | 120,000 |
| Discount negotiated | (12,000) |
| Estate agents fees | (2,160) |
| Solicitors fees | (900) |
| EPC fees | (100) |
| Making property saleable | (2,000) |
| 9 months mortgage payments | (3,038) |
| Survey issues | (1,500) |
| Net cash amount | 97,803 |
Quick sale with Lothian
| House price | 120,000 |
| Discount negotiated | (24,000) |
| Estate agents fees | 0 |
| Solicitors fees | 0 |
| EPC fees | 0 |
| Making property saleable | 0 |
| 9 months mortgage payments | 0 |
| Survey issues | 0 |
| Net cash amount | 96,000 |
We have assumed that you have a pretty good estate agent who doesn’t overvalue your property just to get the sale but even so most buyers expect to negotiate the price down. Despite some horror stories we have used a conservative 10%.
Estate agents’ fees are an area that often catches people out and again, we’ve gone middle of the road.
The problem here is that often a fee will be quoted but it will just be a basic fee and won’t include extras like accompanied viewings or cost of advertising.
You’ll see we’ve added in a line for making the house saleable and Moneysaving expert.com has some great advice here.
In particular Martin Lewis makes the point that doing up your house doesn’t necessarily change the amount of money you can get for a property but it DOES effect how quickly you can sell and the truth is that an agent may be less than glowing about a property that needs a lick of paint so if you don’t want to be waiting over a year to sell then you’ll need to dust off your overalls.
Legal fees can come as a bit of a shock and we’ve used a fairly middle of the road value that is likely for a single house sale although flats and properties with complex ownership of legals can end up costing much more.
We’ve also included a conservative £1,500 (we’ve all heard the horror stories about underpinning!) for any issues that arise from the survey. You’ll either need to make these right or you will need to offer a further discount so your buyers can get the work done.
Often mortgage companies won’t advance money on a house that has survey problems so you’ll need to find the cash up front to sort these out.
We’ve kind of assumed an average of 9 months from contacting an estate agent to completion, which seems about right. Some can go a lot longer but some can be magically quick at around 3-4 months if you are really lucky.
The big difference as you can see is that with Lothian you pay no fees.
Lothian Property buyers take care of all of this for you, leaving you to actually get the cash in your bank that you expect.
With all this to bear in mind it’s no wonder people just want to get it over with!
Is it worth selling your house quickly?
Well truthfully that’s a matter for you.
The difference isn’t actually as big as you might think at first sight and could be entirely sucked up by an adverse survey report so the question for you really is how valuable is selling your house quickly?
If you are prepared to wait a very long time and put up with the extra hassle for the potential of a little more money then hanging on might be the best bet.
If you have a dream house that you want to buy or you need the cash quickly then it certainly looks like an attractive option.
Either way why not call Lothian now and find out what you could get for your property?