What are the Different Costs of Selling your House
We thought it would be helpful to write an article about the different costs involved when trying to sell your home. Unfortunately, it is difficult to find this information summarised in a simple form on the internet so in as few a words as possible the below article will discuss the different options and their associated costs.
Selling via a traditional estate agent
The most obvious and also common route to choose would be via a traditional estate agent. For many homeowners across the UK selling through an estate agent used to be a highly effective way of getting your property sold. Nowadays it is unfortunately a slower process with lees buyers available to walk through your door. None the less if your property is reasonably priced and you are still able to accept a slight discount from the market value, this is still a very viable option. The reason we suggest that you should still be prepared to offer a discount is because realistically even a normal buyer knows it’s a buyers market and will still expect a discount of anything up to around 10%.
The costs of appointing an estate agent can vary and largely depends on whether you appoint an estate agent in either an exclusive or non-exclusive relationship. If you have an exclusive relationship it means that you are only allowed to advertise your property through one estate agent. In doing so it gives the agent more confidence with marketing your home and also they will often charge around 1.5% of the sale price once your home is sold.
If you opt for a non-exclusive relationship you will be able to advertise your home with more than one agent. However, the agent will be less likely to invest in advertising your property. They will usually always list your house on rightmove and unfortunately they do tend to only advertise properties in the local newspaper that they have the sole exclusive rights to. Once your property is sold in a non- exclusive relationship you will often be charged around 3%.
In Scotland slightly different rules apply. The seller will always be required by law to pay for a Scottish Home Report. This will provide the buyer with a structural survey of the house and also it’s market value. The cost of a home report can vary from between £300 – £600. The estate agents also have higher demands than of those based in England. They are not prepared to take the full risk of speculating on advertising your home and will often charge a fee of anything between £500 and £1500 to list your home and take you on their books.
The cost of selling at an Auction
The main cost of selling at auction is the discount that you are required to give in order to get your home sold. The fact that buyers need to complete quickly (usually within 30 days) and will do this through the use of cash or an expensive bridging loan, coupled with the fact that around half of the properties for sale are bank repossessions, you will be required to sell your home for around 30 – 40% less the market value. Other costs involved are a 3- 5% auction house fee and you will also more often than not be required to pay a listing fee of at least a few hundred pounds to be advertised in the auction catalogue.
Whats the cost of selling my house fast to a internet house buyer?
Rather than selling at such a discount an ever more increasingly popular route is to sell to an internet house buyer. Over the past few years since the recession there has been an ever increasing demand for house sellers to sell their homes quickly. At the same time the property investor market has been booming. Internet house buyers have married the two. Most internet house buyers also cover all transaction fees and costs, some require a discount and some for suitable properties may not require any discount whatsoever. New creative techniques that allow property investors to purchase with little deposit also provide a winning solution for the home seller as well.