Questions to ask your estate agent

What you need to know about estate agents

Estate agents are a well-known part of the property market. They provide many homeowners with a simple way to sell their houses or flats, taking on the task of listing and advertising properties and scheduling viewings where potential buyers come to see the place for sale.

They are just one of several ways that you can sell a home, which also include selling it at auction and selling to a fast property buying company. A key difference between the first two options and the third is that quick buyers will never charge you fees for selling.
The general process for selling with an estate agent is fairly straightforward, and it starts with them putting together a listing for your house or flat, describing its main features and including photographs of the interior and exterior. They will then advertise this listing online, in the local newspaper and in their office to get buyers interested. Estate agents also organise viewings where potential buyers can tour your home, and they’ll hear offers from serious buyers.

One important factor to consider is that one situation can occur where a buyer makes an honest offer but then changes their mind and rescinds it and causes the sale to collapse, as highlighted on Fraser Bond’s website. Buyers are able to do this without any penalty so long as contracts are not yet exchanged, and you’ve to start again seeking a buyer

As you decide on which way you’d like to find a buyer for your home, this guide provides you with information on how estate agents work, their pros and cons, and some of the common questions can ask them to decide whether this is the ideal option for selling the property.

Important questions you should ask your estate agent

Whilst many estate agents do provide a valuable service, unfortunately there are a few unscrupulous companies doing business. Some estate agents are known to use sneaky tricks when trying to get your business, for example giving you an overestimated value for your home just so you’ll sell through them even though they know they probably won’t be able to find a buyer at that elevated price.

If you are thinking about selling your home via an estate agent, you should ask some or all of the following questions to help you make a final decision:

Are you a member of The Property Ombudsman (TPO)?

TPO is an independent entity that oversees the estate agent industry and sets rules and regulations that companies must follow which are designed to protect homeowners and buyers from disreputable businesses. Ask your estate agent whether they are a registered member of TPO; if their answer is yes then they are required to follow TPO’s rules and you can likely trust them. But if they say that they’re not a member of TPO you should consider carefully whether to do business with them.

What’s your valuation of my house, and how did you decide that amount?

One way that you can avoid the problem of estate agents overvaluing your house is to ask them upfront the price at which they think you should sell the property, and then ask them for a detailed explanation of how they arrived at that figure. Also, shop around and query other estate agents for a valuation. Many will give you them for free with the goal of securing your business, and you can then compare the different valuations.

What will you charge me in fees for selling my home?

Most estate agents will charge fees anywhere between 1.15 percent and 1.40 percent of the final sale price of your home, including value added tax. Some estate agents will charge fees that are much higher, whilst others might be even lower. Ask your estate agent upfront for their fees, and whether they are open to negotiating them. You will find that some estate agents are open to haggling over the final fee amount .

What will you do to keep track of potential buyers for my house?

This is an important question because it will give you an insight into how the estate agent operates and whether they will energetically try to sell your home. You want to have an estate agent who has a solid plan for not only attracting potential buyers but also staying in touch with them after the viewing to try and help you secure a sale.

Will you be selling my house or will it be someone else on your team?

An important part of working with an estate agent when selling your home is building a great relationship with them, so that you are assured they are doing a good job and that they will keep you constantly updated on the status of any potential interested buyers. If you ask this question and the estate agent says someone else will ultimately be handling the sale, it can be a lot harder to build that special relationship.

Do you have experience selling a property like mine?

It’s crucial that you find an estate agent who knows how to sell a house or flat like the one you are selling. There are many different homes of all shapes and sizes on the market, and some estate agents specialise in selling just one type of property. If they don’t have experience selling a house like yours then it’s possible the estate agent will struggle to find a buyer, and that’s why this question is so important.

Pros and cons of selling your home via an estate agent

After asking estate agents the questions detailed above, and before making a final decision on how to sell your home, it can be useful to learn about the specific benefits and drawbacks of finding a buyer this way.

Some of the advantages of selling via an estate agent include:

Useful experience: Some estate agents in your area might have been in business for many years, giving them deep knowledge of the property market that makes it easier to find a buyer.

Large network: If there are several estate agents located near your home then this also expands the potential network of buyers that these professionals could be able to reach.

Minimal effort: Selling with an estate agent is great for those owners that don’t want to put much work into finding a buyer, as the estate agent will handle all the main tasks.

And the downsides of trying the find a buyer through an estate agent are:

Lengthy process: Selling through an estate agent can take a very long time, so you should not be surprised if it takes many months, or even more than a full year, to sell this way.

Expensive fees: Expect to pay commission with a range of 1.15 percent to 1.40 percent of your home’s final sale price, and this cost will be subtracted from the final sale proceeds immediately.

Multiple viewings: You’ll need to agree to potentially dozens or more viewings when selling this way, and many homeowners find these visits from buyers to be time-consuming and intrusive.

Alternative options to find a buyer for your property

If you ultimately opt against using an estate agent to sell your house or flat, there are three other ways that you consider looking a buyer. You could try your luck with a property auction, sell your home to a quick buyer such as LDN Properties, or attempt to sell it on your own.

Just as using an estate agent has its own pros and cons, there are benefits and drawbacks of the three other methods based on how long they take, their potential cost and other factors.

It can be useful to write down your top aims with selling, such as your goal sale price, how fast you want to find a buyer and whether you can accept paying commission. Then compare these elements against the details of the three choices below to find the best match for your needs

Selling at a property auction

With a property auction, people will have the chance to place bids of increasing value on your home, and the top bid at the time the auction ends is announced as the winner and therefore the person buying your flat or house. Just note that if you do not receive any bids then your home remains unsold, and you would have start over with trying to find a buyer.

You might also receive just one bid at the reserve price, which is the lowest value at which you can accept selling your home. This bid is considered a binding legal agreement to sell, and the buyer can sue to enforce the sale if you attempt to walk away from it after the auction. This is why you need to devise a reserve price that should generate a profit from the auction even after paying the auctioneer’s fee, otherwise you might sell at a loss or only just break even.

Typically, an auctioneer will charge commission at about 2.5 percent of a property’s sale price, and this fee will increase your costs because it will be subtracted from the sale proceeds immediately. You could ask auctioneers if they are open to reducing their commission rate or having the buyer pay a share of your costs, as this can help with lowering your expenses.

If you want to sell as fast as possible then you might want to consider other options because an auction can take a long time, starting with a wait of many weeks or months between when you choose this selling method and when the auction happens. If your property sells, the buyer then has about a month to sign all the legal papers and finish the other steps to complete the sale.

You could ask auctioneers if they are willing to shorten the amount of time that a buyer has for these tasks, which can help with speeding up the sale. But beware that many auctioneers might give the buyer even more than a month, which would extending your selling timeline further.

Selling to a quick home buyer

Or you might want to sell your home to a quick buyer such as LDN Properties, which has that name because this and similar companies make speedy and fair offers buy all types of freehold and leasehold homes, and can complete the entire process within a few short weeks.

They are able to move so fast because they already have the funds in place to purchase your property, so there’s no waiting for many weeks or months to first get approval for a mortgage in order to afford the transaction. This accelerates the timeline for selling and makes them on average much speedier than any of the other options to find a buyer for a house or flat.

Quick buyers can also be a solid choice for those owners of homes with problems, whether that’s physical damage like damp or a leaking roof, legal issues such as a dispute over access to the property, or anything else. These companies will give you a competitive offer for your home regardless of issues such as its age, condition, location, shape, size or type.

LDN Properties, launched in 2003, has a long list of varied purchases throughout the UK that includes mews houses, properties with a defective title, flats with noisy neighbours, homes that are located near to electricity lines, houses situated under an airport flight bath, properties that have Artex, flats with a rentcharge, homes with council tax arrears, houses of multiple occupancy, flats with only a short time left on the lease agreement, and many other scenarios.

You can also avoid having to pay any commission when selling to a quick buyer because the honest companies will never charge a seller fees when purchasing their home. That compares favourably to selling through an auctioneer or an estate, as those two options will add to your costs because you will have to pay commission if your property sells, adding to your costs.

To start the process of selling to a quick buyer, give them a call and within an hour of talking to them you should receive a tentative offer on your property. There is zero pressure to make an immediate decision, as most quick buyers will give you at least a week to think about it.

Should you accept that initial offer, the quick buyer will then have one of their representatives visit your house or flat so that they can inspect the interior and exterior before making a final offer. You will only have to agree to this single viewing when selling to a quick buyer, rather than the multiple viewings that you may need to accept when selling through other methods.

The quick buyer will then make a final offer, and if you accept it they will move rapidly to work with your solicitor or other legal representative to sign all of the required legal documents and finish the other tasks need before exchanging contracts and paying you the sale proceeds.

If you want additional reassurance about selling this way, you can ask the quick buyer if they belong to TPO. Just as the organisation sets rules for how estate agents must operate, it does the same for the quick buying industry, offering protections for sellers. Never sell your home to a company that cannot prove it is a member of TPO, as it might be a fraudulent business.

You can check the membership status of a quick buyer by visiting TPO’s website, clicking on the “Find a Member” button on the main page and then typing in the name of a company. If they are a true TPO member like LDN Properties, you will be shown their full registration details. If you get no results then the company is not a TPO member and selling to them could be a scam.

Selling without any help

Finally, you could try to sell your home without any third-party assistance. This would require that you take care of all the work needed to find a buyer, starting with producing and advertising a listing, then scheduling viewings, hearing offers and trying to get one to a successful sale. It’s only usually recommended as an option for owners who have previously managed to sell a property, or who have a suitably qualified friend or family member that can help with the sale.

This can be a slow and stressful process, and it might take more than a full year to receive a genuine offer. Even then, someone could cancel that offer without penalty before contracts are exchanged. It would make the sale fall apart, and require that you begin again with process of trying to find a buyer, which could add much more time to the selling schedule.

The only clear benefit of selling this way is that you will not have to pay commission to an estate agent or auctioneer once you find a buyer, which helps with reducing your costs. But is possible that any saving you make as a result could be cancelled out by the amount of money that you would need to spend on advertising your listing and the other steps involved with selling.

As an alternative, you could sell your home to zero-fee quick buyer like LDN Properties. This would give you the same beneficial outcome of not having to pay any commission on the sale of your home, but with the extra advantage of being able to finalise the sale of the property within a handful of weeks – and that includes the last stages of exchanging contracts and receiving the sale proceeds. It’s a streamlined and no-hassle way to speedily get a buyer for your home.