First home buyers-prepared to renovate or not?

Hi everyone, thanks for your advice. I think I will try to find someone who is available next weekend to see what the agent is doing. We need a quick sale as we are getting the keys to our new house in two weeks so we are prepared to drop the price a bit to sell it. Really, it is fine to live in as is and the location is great, probably needs about $15,000 spent on it but you could live in it for a while first. After all, we do and we are quite comfortable. Mich, I found your comments really interesting as for some reason I don’t think we have attracted the right demographic. I have said all along, I think the ad wasn’t worded correctly for this property.

Unfortunately, I really think it depends on the buyer. When my husband and I were house hunting (back home) our realtor took us this townhouse that kinda looked run down and had the 60’s shaggy carpet through out the house but we saw past that. The townhouse looked structurally like a New York loft and we knew we would have to put in 15000 to renovate to our standards. We put in an offer, renovated, two years later when we moved to Australia sold our house in 3 hours and made a 120 thousand dollar profit! Maybe if the feedback you’re getting is it needs too much work then think of about renovating what needs to be done and then put it on the market for more money.

When we were looking for the house we live in now, we had already paid off the townhouse we lived in at the time, so we weren’t in any rush to buy something that wasn’t quite right, we had a set lists of must have’s and a list of would like to have’s, anyting that didn’t fit those criteria was not even considered. We looked first at, structurally did the house have everything we wanted, then at weather reno’s were needed then the asking price, and estimated reno costs.

So we were prepared to renovate, but it was all dependant on making no structural changes to the house design.

You may find your agent is bringing in people who arent actually looking for what our house has to offer, the amount of times agents wasted our time taking us through houses that did not suit was incredible, for eg we needed a room, of 5m by 8m totally rectangular, to fit a full sized snooker table in, and the agents just didn’t get it, that if it didn’t have that room as a starting point then we ren’t interested.

I’d also get a freind to crash an open house and see whats going on, then if you arent happy change agents, eventually someone will come along who loves what they see. It took a long time to sell our townhouse, which we found bizzare as it was huge with 4 bedrooms, still dont understand it really.

Hooha, if your not happy with the agent, give them the flick. We had the same problem a few years back, our agent did nothing to sell our house. We had some open houses and the agent just stood there, didn’t even talk to the people coming in.
I really think the housing market is just slow at the moment but I always say, it takes only 1 person to come in and see the potential in the house. I hope it sells for you quick though, so good luck.

as long as the house is structurally sound, we would buy it,
We are looking for an older bungalow type house to renovate, ideally with a bit of a backyard.

Also I sold a house a few years ago, get a friend family member to go to the open and chat to the agent! Best way to find out what happens 😉

Also the banks have pulled alot of people’s pre-approvals in the last few months due to change in borrowing conditions, it is increasingly harder, if you are over 30 or have children banks dont want to deal with you either.

Hooha,

I am a huge believer in having the right agent. If you are not happy with the agent you might want to consider changing if there is no interest in the next couple of weeks. I would have thought that you should have had the right to approve the advertising. I would get a friend to go through the property and listen to what the agent says about the place. That way, you can get a better view as to whether the agent is being helpful or not.

Sometimes it takes a while before the buyer appears so don’t get too disheartened at this stage. Having said that, I would check out your current agent.

Hope this helps. x

I would give it a little more time and maybe changes agents. I know some can be mind the french but crap or have a crap agent

Hey MissMac, we have let the real estate agent know. I am not sure what he is telling people to be honest. I didn’t like the way they wrote the ad much either, I think it should have maybe said something about a few renos being needed. We don’t seem to be getting the right people coming to have a look if that makes sense?

does the company you going through letting people know they can negotiate with you? Maybe give them a reminder

I think that’s very true, houses just continue to go up. I think it’s better to just jump in and get something you can afford. Hopefully soon someone will come through and see the potential. We have a great location, we are only moving because we want something slightly bigger. Lots of places in our area have only two bedrooms so we were hoping the fact that we have three might attract someone. Nobody seems to have realised that they could actually negotiate us down a bit as well.