Steyning: 01903 879488   |  Henfield: 01273 495392   |  Mayfair: 020 7467 5330

HJ Burt Estate Agents in Steyning and Henfield

With domestic finances becoming stretched and the property market beginning to favour buyers, Nick Churton of our Mayfair Office explains how sellers can maximise their return through some simple cost effective action.
 
Let’s face it, we are all trying to find ways of making a pound stretch a little further these days.
 
For home sellers the best way is to make their properties worth more. That might sound like an expensive exercise, but it really needn’t be.
 
To add more value the first thing you need to do is to find more room. So, make some more room. Declutter. Everything you don’t need in your home that isn’t beautiful, useful or valuable is hiding extra space from a potential buyer. Put another way, everything you take out in a pre-sale declutter can make your property more attractive to a purchaser.
 
Now for the hard work. But it still won’t cost you anything apart from a bottle of Mr Muscle or two (other products are available). Clean your house as if our late queen were coming for tea. Clean all of it - every corner, nook and cranny – especially the kitchen and bathroom. Clean and polish your property as if achieving the best price depends on it – because it does.
 
It will take a week or two to do all this properly, but it will be worth it.
 
Once that’s finished, if you have a friend who is good with interiors invite them around and pick their brains. Don’t be embarrassed; an amateur interior designer likes nothing more than primping someone else’s cushions. Your property has become a business in which you happen to live. Choose a highly experienced estate agent who will also be delighted to make some buyer-friendly suggestions. You want to get the best price, so listen to good advice.
 
Now take a look at your freshly polished home. If you are so thrilled that you think it belongs to someone else or you are tempted not to sell at all but stay put, then you know you have done a great job and that viewers will be impressed.
 
You could add a loft extension, build a fabulous rear room with bi-fold doors to the garden, dig out a basement room, re-fit the kitchen and bathroom, engage a firm of professional cleaners or hire stagers. But self-cleaning and de-cluttering is always the most cost-effective way to get more for your property. And remember, with many more houses and flats coming onto the market, your home will be lining up in a competitive race to the completion line.
 
In WWII, there was a phrase, make do and mend. If you are selling your property in these straitened times a phrase for now could be, make do and polish.

H J Burt are proud to be sponsoring the St Peter's School Fireworks evening.

Friday 4th November from 6pm

 

 

Two completions today for our Steyning Office and two happy clients. Lovely way to start a weekend!

 

If ever we needed a crash course on how world events affect our daily lives, the past few months have provided us with a masterclass.

From the Russian invasion of Ukraine and its economic aftermath to our monarch and prime minister changing in a few weeks, there has been national bewilderment.
 
Of course, our press has done a great job in alerting us to all the dreadful things that could make things even worse, and this fanning of the flames of fear has sent shockwaves through all sorts of markets, including property.
 
But there are property market drivers that neither the press or the Russian president can affect because they have no control over such matters. These are the A to D of the property market.
 
A is for ambition – the personal ambition to live somewhere better, bigger, smaller, prettier, more convenient, more rural or urban.
B is for birth – as our families grow, we need more space.
C is for consolidation – people getting together to cohabit or downsizing after children have left home.
D is for death, debt and divorce – those three drivers on their own stimulate a high proportion of movement in the market.
 
Back in the 1980s we learned that the people we could rely on in a tough property market were ourselves, our families and our friends. Also, our estate agents. The reference to estate agents is not a glib remark: right now, with interest rates rising, lenders panicking, and buyers and sellers rightly concerned, it is the steady hand of an experienced estate agent that will provide focused calm and wise counsel.
 
If you are wondering about the right time to buy or sell property, remember the A to D of the property market. Individually we are not driven by war or a fallen monarch, and we shouldn’t be persuaded by rising or falling house prices. Instead, we should be driven by what is best for us as individuals.
 
When is the best time to buy or sell a property? Within the constraints of affordability it should be when it is most suitable for us and our families.

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