So, you’re sat flicking through Rightmove, checking out all the latest properties that are on the market and you come across a set of details with photos so bad that you just can’t quite work out how on earth someone let those pictures of their house go online, let alone why the estate agent would use them to try and sell the property.
I see this a lot, and I meet many people that tell me similar stories of their house-hunting. Some details are so bad that more than one person is making comment on them.
One key piece of value that an estate agent should bring to the table is their ability to market property to a very high standard and give advice on presentation. If someone was going to charge you £3000 or more to sell your home, you’d expect that person to not only be good, but an expert in their field, right? Well you would, wouldn’t you?
If you were selling your property, and the agent sent you these images to sign off, would you go for it? Click to see details.
Property details matter. They have a MASSIVE impact on how well your property sells and the price you get for it. Do you want buyers looking at the worst representation of your house possible, or at it looking it’s best? I take it as my personal duty to make a house look its best. That is what you’d expect for the money, right?
The next piece of key value an agent should bring is their knowledge and expertise. You’d expect an agent to have a greater knowledge of selling property than you have yourself. If you’re spending all that money, you’d want that knowledge to be of the highest standard.
The difficulty I see with estate agency is that there are far too many people that don’t possess the knowledge required to be totally transparent in their dealings. Have you ever experienced a fib from an agent? And for all intents and purposes, most likely a totally pointless fib too. My personal experience has been that when an estate agent tells a fib, it’s mostly out of lack of expertise. They don’t have the answer to what you need and rather than admit that, it’s quicker and easier to go to the tried and tested fib they use over and over again.
If there’s a problem with your sale, you would expect your agent to be able to swiftly deal with it in your best interests as quickly as possible and for you to be able to trust that advice too.
Viewings. Viewings are so, so, so important to a property sale. It’s not rocket science to show someone round a property, but getting the all important information from the buyers whilst keeping their focus on the good points of the property and aware of the bad has a skill to it. No hounding, but not simply opening the door and letting them wander round either.
Negotiation. Selling houses isn’t like selling spades on the beach in summer time. You would expect your estate agent to possess skills to expertly negotiate the sale of your property on your behalf, right? One of the hardest parts of negotiating a sale is that being hard-nosed about things will usually come and bite you later on down the line. Once you’ve agreed a sale, you’ve still got a long way to go before the money’s in your account, so annoying your buyer during negotiations is a sure-fire way of them digging their heels in on something later down the line, or re-negotiating on the back of the dreaded survey. You can get the best price possible whilst being nice and that’s where the agents should come in to their own.
An estate agent should be on your team and have your best interests at heart at all times. If any of these three things are lacking in their service or approach, find an agent that does have them. You don’t want to end up paying an agent a lot of money for them to get you less for your house than you could have done with a better service.
Simon Ward
Owner
01202 387718
