Buying & Selling - Chicken & Egg or maybe not?

Buying & Selling - Chicken & Egg or maybe not?

Good afternoon everyone

The internet and variety of property programmes hogging primetime television slots means that anyone and everyone is a self-confessed property expert. Today's buyer is often quoted saying something along the lines of 'I am not selling my property until I have found the right property to buy, my property will only take two days to sell.' This may have been the case two years ago, but we are now in a very different climate, one which requires a different approach for those serious about a move and that invariably means getting your property on the market before you go out and find somewhere.

Here are some advantages of agreeing a sale before you offer on a property to buy;

• It puts you in a stronger position when buying. The seller you want to buy from would almost certainly prefer a buyer in a proceedable position, rather than enter into an incomplete chain, where their sale is dependent upon you finding someone to buy your house.
• You remove the stress of losing out on your dream home.
• You remain in control of the sale of your own house - because you won't need to make a quick sale, you will not be pressurised into selling cheaply
• Those with time on their side are usually in the strongest negotiating position
• You may get a better price if you find a seller who is keen to move quickly
• You will know exactly how much you can spend because you'll have agreed a sale price for your property - buying your new home won't be dependent on you achieving unrealistic value for your property.

Since the summer months the property market has resembled a chess match with buyers and sellers playing cat and mouse feeling this is the best way to protect their interests whilst not realising, that by doing this they are manoeuvring themselves further away from the objective of moving home by being too clever for their own good.

If you are serious about moving, what's the worst thing that can happen if you market your home before seriously looking to buy? You might go under offer and struggle to find somewhere, in which case you can walk away from the process and try again at a later date. In this market, the pluses far outweigh the one possible downside of coming to market first, trust me it makes sense.

Published on 07 December 2017

Written by Neil Leahy