Bewilderment as asking prices for houses bounce

wooden top: May I remind you that I was here pre-Jonnie! (unless he just changed his pen-name, of course...) I'm glad you found it entertaining - question is, did you (and others...) agree with the underlying statement?

• 21 October 2010 15:42 PM

Well if nothing else it just goes to show how people who are not estate agents have a single minded view on a subject that they actually don't know about. Maybe if they did, they wouldn't be so anti towards estate agent. No wonder the industry continues to be perceived at the bottom of the pile by a limited few.

• 21 October 2010 13:04 PM

Look out Jonnie, PeeBee's after your job. very entertaining LOL

• 21 October 2010 12:58 PM

DON LOGAN

"I love the notion that some of you guys believe estate agnecy to be a 'profession'. I can guarantee you that no-one else does."

I CAN ASSURE YOU ALL MY OFFICES AND STAFF ARE, PEREHAPS YOU WORK FOR A CORPORATE??

• 20 October 2010 07:35 AM

KingC34 - you're new here, so it is not evident whether you are in the industry or not. Your 'worst example' - a re-listed property at 25% mark-up on last year. Do you know FOR FACT that the property is in exactly the same condition that it was then? That it hasn't been substantially improved or even extended? Has it not been "Beeny'd" - bought for coppers at auction, painted cream and otherwise pimped up? Your argument can ONLY hold water if ALL the facts are presented, otherwise as I have often said there is no like-for-like comparison. You cannot just go onto Nethouseprices and shriek "OH, HORROR!" Over to you for further detail...

• 19 October 2010 17:56 PM

Bob: Firstly, Borg drones do not "realise"; they are part of a collective, with a single purpose. They do, however, adapt to situations - which is exactly what Estate Agents do to survive in the icy cold expanse that is the housing market. You see, the housing market is ALWAYS on the brink of collapse. It is driven by forces outside of human control - want; need; and greed being three of the biggest. These forces also control balance of world power, and wars - but no-one blamed Estate Agents when Hitler set off for Poland, did they? Star Trek carried many messages within its' episodes - some even had Biblical origins. All were similar in that different cultures, races and species wished to explore space in order to seek out new civilisations; "to boldly go where no-one has gone before." We are entering yet another phase of the housing market (every dawn brings a new day and fresh challenges...). Those who want to, and who can, WILL adapt. They will Live Long and Prosper, as they say on Vulcan. PeeBee out. Beam me up, Scotty... ;0)

• 19 October 2010 17:25 PM

Myra: I am in a strange position here - uncharted waters - I actually almost AGREE with something you have said! The NSNF business model was initially a differentiator, but was often found to be used by Agents who NEEDED a USP because they couldn't brag about anything else. Unfortunately, it is now almost universal, so there would have to be a complete change of mindset in order to revert (in a great percentage of instances, to try for the first time...) to abortive charges. Been there, done it - it's really nothing to squeak about although the bicycle clips are needed for the first few times of asking! Trouble is, there will ALWAYS be the faction who will not change, so the hard work done by others is somewhat undone. So, that's the agreeing bit over (and I am pretty sure that it will never happen again...) - now to the rest of your post. You have picked half a sentence from an individual who has voiced volumes on this site mainly in attack of the profession you claim to represent, and give him your backing. Lady - you are quite some piece of work! There are a number of regular posters on this site - INCLUDING Jonnie - who I have no doubt could buy Mr Wilson in one breath and sell him with the next. They live and breathe the housing market. The industry has lost many in recent times: some are a true loss; some will never be missed as they were not up to the challenge and did not understand the gravity of the job. You are in the company of your peers here - TRUE professionals - and they represent their industry FAR, far better than you can or ever will, judging by what you post here. I take NO pleasure out of commenting this way - but as I have said before, you really need to think about the fact that this industry puts food on your table, petrol in your car - and no doubt a roof over your head - before you slag it off the way you do! There - rant over. I am sure you will respond accordingly, in the manner we have come to expect from you...

• 19 October 2010 17:00 PM

Mike Wilson's comments spot on unlike silly billy boyos like little Jonnie. The No Sale No Fee model is broken, time for change;.

• 19 October 2010 13:38 PM

...you wouldnt be Bob the Builder by any chance????? :P

• 19 October 2010 11:51 AM

Industy Observer: "My son and his partner were absolutely rock solid buyers, good incomes and big deposit but got gazumped three times before they eventually bought..." Unless they offered the asking price, they were NOT gazumped. If they did, it can only be assumed that this was at a time near the height of the market when bidding wars were rife. Either way, no laws were broken; and more to the point, the Agent was undoubtedly acting on the vendors' instructions - which is their job! Agents can - as I am sure you are aware - only advise their clients as to usual protocol and offer etiquette. It is the vendors' decision to accept offers; and to then accept another offer at any point leading up to exchange of legal Contracts. Some vendors remain loyal to purchasers they have accepted offers from; others do not. That's life. I'm sure your son has got over it - pity that you obviously havent!

• 18 October 2010 22:16 PM

I really cannot believe that you are an Agent, with the attitude you portray on here! Time for you to think about your actions before you act them out, young lady. You come on a publicly viewable platform; slag off most/all Agents (except yourself...) as inept - then wonder why you are tarred with the same brush you loaded! The industry is lucky to have the likes of you - I think not!

• 18 October 2010 22:05 PM

Selection by valuation just does not work but the idiot vendor thinks they must be right as all the others were lower.

Just last week a bloke came in and said had my house valued and its gone up over 30 grand in a year. What have you got says I he says a 2 bed semi that another agent valued just a year ago at £210K. Says me you have no chance at the higher figure because 3 bed houses don’t make that around where you live. Idiot leaves the office knows for certain my 40 years in the business has taught me nothing. I cant wait to see what it sells at if of course it does and I will be tempted to call him and say see - told you so.

Get real you idiots and value as a surveyor does, use the same research and get deals done.

Better still go out and keep overvaluing everything and go out of business and leave it to us grown ups to do it properly, we can then get decent fees that you have no idea how to get agreed

• 18 October 2010 19:00 PM

I agree.

I'm seeing plenty of down sizers and not many up sizers, so the avera

• 18 October 2010 18:31 PM

Overpricing on the assumption that buyers will haggle down a price and think they have got a bargain won't work this time around. Might have had a chance in the 90s crash, but now buyers simply look at sold prices on Rightmove etc. Worst example I've spotted in my area at the moment is a property on for 25% more than the current owner paid a year ago. Just makes the agent look incompetent.

• 18 October 2010 17:58 PM

Bob – right mate – pin your ears back – you seem like one of those chaps that likes to have the inside track on stuff so you can talk with knowledge and authority rather than ones of those people that is badly misinformed and a bit of a bore…………………

Now, this is a secret so don’t tell anyone okay? – estate agents don’t control prices, shh, keep it to your self – seriously, I wish we did mate but it’s a mysterious thing called market forces, works a bit like the teleporter on Star Trek, no one really knows how or why but lots of people have an opinion on it.

Smetimes prices get a bit ‘rumpy’ – cant be helped, usually caused by a flood of optimism in the market but the agents just manage the changes in the market, been that way for years.

Then we get those gobby types that have been banging on about what they know for sure is going to happen at any one time never call it right and never will.

Corse mate, clever bloke like you – you’ve always been right aint ya? I bet you laughed your balls off when you brought all those flats at the bottom of the market with cheap money then flogged them all in October 2007 – you clever sod eh? I wish I had your foresight. Im just an idiot been doing it 20 years, never made a penny out of it.

Jonnie

• 18 October 2010 17:32 PM

If Seven of Nine from Star Trek was listening to you estate agents and your ramblings about valuations and asking prices she would look at you lot busy ramping up asking prices higher and higher, appealing to your own and sellers greed and then, quite rightly, say:

"It will be your undoing!"

It does not take a Borg drone to realise that the UK housing market is on the brink of collapse, that by this time next year thousands of estate agents will be unemployed and it will all be because you simply gave ludicrous over-valuations of prices to greedy sellers.

You are over-valuing all the way to the dole queue and you can't even see it coming! LMAO!

• 18 October 2010 16:30 PM

My point being that you (responsible agents) and your trade associations need to start singing from the same hymn sheet. 'This is not a market for ambitious pricing', 'only realistically priced properties are getting viewings and selling' etc.

Repeat loud and often, get it in the media and for heaven's sake start price conditioning vendors.

Maybe then Rightmove wouldn't have to report asking prices going up 3.5% in a month at a time when sales are few and far between. Just what the industry needs is vendors reading that prices are going up when they aren't.

• 18 October 2010 16:29 PM

Nice couple get 3 or 4 valuations. One agent - often the new kid on the block - values higher than the others. The vendor insists on going on higher still.

In a normal market this tactic might work. House may or may not sell, as long as agent sends a few punters around, lack of an offer, or low offers, may get vendor to drop price but stick with agent.

In today's market, vendor gets hardly any viewings and, fed up, takes property off market and gives to different agent 'in the Spring', 'in the New Year', 'in 6 months time'.

In my area (Berkshire) there is a stand off at the moment. Agents have got dozens of properties they can't shift of their books but still the new stuff is coming on at unachievable prices.

And, of course, each vendor is watching the market like a hawk. 'One's just come on in Beechwood Crescent at £475k - makes ours look cheap at £435k - I'm definitely not dropping the price'

And so it goes on, and on, and on.

As I said the 'no-sale, no-fee, value highest to get an instruction' has no place in a falling market.

Unless you are happy with transactions at a third of the levels of a normal market.

• 18 October 2010 16:15 PM

I love the notion that some of you guys believe estate agnecy to be a 'profession'. I can guarantee you that no-one else does.

• 18 October 2010 16:07 PM

Right – hands up who has heard of the following happen;

Nice couple get house valued by 3 / 4 agents.

Nice couple pick an agent but set the price higher than he said

Agent takes instruction and begins marketing

Agent has no luck, nice couple know it and they all have a grown up conversation and reduce the price

House sells.


…………………..happened here a few times – anyone else? Or are we all doomed to a life of drowning in over priced stock? – it’s a people business, you work with your vendor, build the trust and sell houses – not sure what Mikes going on about below

Jonnie

• 18 October 2010 15:30 PM

wooden top - no I haven't. Hope you weren't picking on me again...? ;0)

• 18 October 2010 15:14 PM

And agents are unable to advise vendors that 'at that price you will not get any viewings' and walk away from an instruction that will only cost them money?

No, of course they can't. They'd never get an instruction. Time for some blue sky thinking I think.

• 18 October 2010 15:10 PM

Well you guys had better come up with something fast. At this rate in a year's time your industry will be half its present size.

In current market conditions your 'no sale-no fee, value at the highest price to get the instruction' business model seems doomed. You need some fresh thinking and a lead to be taken.

Where's the NAEA when you need them?

• 18 October 2010 15:07 PM

Haseveryone missed the obvious?, the asking prices are going up to counteract the fact that any offers received will be a hell of a lot lower than the asking price anyway, so house worth £220k put on market at £235k, may receive offer of £210. Buer thinks they are geting a bargain, seller gets closer to what they wanted for the house.Simples!

• 18 October 2010 14:07 PM

Come on everyone, you are missing one vital point.

A lot of agents are very needy self important people (not all), whose image is very important and a way to measure this importance is by the number of for sale boards they have up in their town.

It does not stand to reason in a market like this, and with buyers having access to sold prices, that this policy of "instruction at any price" will be successful, and many of these self-indulgent, cowardly agents will vanish over the next three or four months, and leave the job to the agents who can be trusted to deliver the correct price advice.

Lets face it boards breed boards, and if you get one house price wrong on a modern estate you can end up with a whole shelf of un-saleable houses.

Give sellers correct pricing advice and if they don't like it - tell them not to bother - they will only distort the market for everyone else.

• 18 October 2010 13:19 PM

Jonnie, once again you talk sense, it's such a shame though that we both have time to spend on this site, indeed I have already done my 1 valuation (sorry market appraisal or whatever) of the week and needless to say it was the normal, 'well we will put it on the market if we find somewhere' followed by, 'oh no we want more than £200,000 for it'(its a 3 bed ex LA semi the most one has ever sold for is 190k)..'there was a cottage on the market for 250k a few years ago..etc etc. yep all agents would love all there stock to be the right price, but it ain't ever going to happen. I will always value a property correctly and then 9/10 have to justify why my figure is less than so and so agent (independents just as bad as the corporates)more often than not though i am happy to put a house on the market at the other agents price and hope for a slice of luck or to sell it in several months time after some price reductions- i think the majority of agents do the same

• 18 October 2010 12:03 PM

Hi PeeBee did you pick up my reply on another thread due to the glitch in EAT "reply post" last Friday?

• 18 October 2010 11:58 AM

I've said it before & I'll say it again...POLARISED BUYERS. FTBs and low LTV have no chance, whilst others have the finance & are willing. If it means vendors wait another 6 months to sell at the higher price...they will. It's their choice. Just screws our volumes unfortunatly.

• 18 October 2010 11:48 AM

How colleagues encouraging fantasist vendors in what's clearly a market on the edge of a big fall - volumes having collapsed already - is beyond me. The only way forward as a profession is to tell it like it is, however hard that may be for some!

• 18 October 2010 11:35 AM

INDUSTRY OBSERVER - You are quite frustrating, half brilliant common sense and half misguided and making numerous wrong assumptions, I often take the mickey out of the attitude that you (and others) have about estate agents view on ever increasing prices but today im going to try and be serious for a bit and point out some issues you have missed / don’t understand / realise

So here we go………………………………………..


1. Estate agents are very much in the real world, most of us have our desks 6 feet away from the house buying high street – you don’t get much closer to the reality of the house market.
2. We DO NOT control prices – it’s a free market, we would love to have control of them but the public control them, ill use your story of you son being gazumped – that was three members of the public that did that not the agents
3. Gormless greedy vendors? Erm, this is an odd one - ill skip over the gormless bit but greedy – well yes, but only as greedy as the market allows them to be – sort of back to point 2 for this
4. Your view on lenders is spot on – I agree
5. Your view on Rightmove and others bunging out press releases is also on the money and something ive posted on many times.
6. Right – this leaves us talking up the market, we are paid huge sums of money by our clients to represent them in the market place, we have a responsibility to them, would you expect to go to a restaurant and have the waiter tell you the food is rubbish? Do you go to a car dealer and listen to the salesman tell you how uneconomical and badly made the car is? No, you don’t, we are retailing a product for a paying customer, and their interests come first.
7. You’re also wrong on the shelling peas thing, no matter how good the market is our clients think its better, fees come down dramatically and volumes drop as so few people want to take the plunge and go on the market before they see something, which they cant because everything sells so quick so we have little mass to create chains from – we like steady solid predictable conditions, bit like sailing.
8. The HIP thing is way off as well, agents happily produced them in line with the legislation and no one ever looked at them, the EPC has stayed and they do get looked at.

Jonnie

• 18 October 2010 11:27 AM

Industry Observer, that makes three, lol and it's the vendor the majority of the time?

It's not just corporates over pricing but indepenedent are doing it in my area. The last month has shown a vast drop in new valuations/instructions and agents are fighting over the scraps to get them on their books. The worst culprits are actually the two corporates, who I know from personal experience are under pressure to "get it on the books at all costs" from management (those guys and dolls that drive around with a whipp but never speak to a vendor) and must be costing them a fortune in champagne as they return to the old days of "top negotiator for price reductions of the week".

Maybe we will start to see a return of the corporates with an abandone rate of 60%!

Independents hold your ground, be truthfull, be smart, be professional and you will survive.

I have doubts over RM stats, I look at them weekly. Many of my properties have over 200K hits a week, so how come no-one phones to view!!!!!

• 18 October 2010 11:18 AM

Oh - I forgot to add - a 'good' Agent can be independent OR corporate! There are good, bad, and indifferent in both camps...

• 18 October 2010 11:08 AM

What has that to do with my post - or anything I have ever said??? I was simply pointing out here that statistics are what you want them to be. I have NEVER said what you have written. Allow me to tell you my definition of a "good Agent". A 'good' Agent can - and will - maximise the price they achieve for a vendor. They will NOT give the client unrealistic information with regard to the value or saleability of the subject property with the sole aim of winning the instruction. They will price a property at a figure which is realistic enough to encourage interest; one which should lead to offers being generated. They will use their skills to negotiate the highest possible offer out of the potential buyers. They will at all times act in the best interests of their client. Is THAT clear enough for you?

• 18 October 2010 10:58 AM

Dear oh dear oh dear. I was going to comment on the immensely sensible but totally unworkable article last week from the RICS guy who wanted agents made liable for overpriced houses. I knew when I saw the headline what the response would be and yet again I wasn’t disappointed. You estate agents really do need to wake up and live in the real world.
There are only two industries responsible for overpricing house – surveyors or valuers or call them what you will, and estate agents. Plus of course gormeless greedy vendors.
The lenders statistics are always slightly misleading because it depends where the bulk of their lending takes place. For years Nationwide was heavily southern based and Halifax northern. It has evened out somewhat now but whoever commented on local variations is dead right. The problem is with such restricted lending now the sample cannot be big enough to give an accurate picture area by area.
Right Move should stick ‘close to the knitting’ as Tom Peters would say. Stick to what you are good at and just run a hugely overpriced portal and stop commenting on the market, just service it. Same goes for Paragon and the rest of them.
The only figures ever worth taking note of are the Land Registry OK they are always historical but what does that matter f they are accurate? But even then for data on NEW lending they’d have to exclude remortgages and are incapable of doing that. And why should they bother anyway.
MP’s are now the most despised ‘profession’ followed by bankers. Journalists and estate agents who used to top the poll of most despised closely follow. Is it any wonder when all agents want to do is talk up the market – and why do they want to do that? Two reasons amongst many – first it makes life much easier for them, selling houses is like shelling peas in a solid and above all rising market. Second commission is set as a percentage of sale price. Recipe for inflated asking though not necessarily selling prices.
My son and his partner were absolutely rock solid buyers, good incomes and big deposit but got gazumped three times before they eventually bought through the only truly professional agent with integrity that they dealt with locally. Don’t you realise there is something badly flawed in your market? And don’t you want to do something about it?
I have asked before and I will ask again as an example. HIPs were a consumer driven product. Has any estate agent ever had a buyer who didn’t think HIPs were a good thing. Honestly you lot have more blinkers on that in the 2.30 at Newmarket

• 18 October 2010 10:37 AM

So what happened to the price them high as a good agent can achieve it comment PB!! It just proves my point,bad desperate agents killing any good press we worked for.

• 18 October 2010 10:31 AM

There's an 'expert' for everything these days - and no more so than in the wonderful world of the property market. Pundits can (and do...) proclaim anything they want, and as long as it is negative, it gets column inches. Be positive - and you're laughed at. Ask 1000 'property experts' for their predictions and you will get 1100 answers!

In this particular instance, Rightmove have turned what should be a positive right on its' a$$ and made a negative out of it! You just can't figure what goes on in the minds of some...

With regard to historic stats, the same applies. They all know best, and draw on their own data. LR obviously is the most accurate (how scary is that...), as it quotes actual transactions - well... information fed to it anyways... albeit a couple of months or so backdated (and therefore already obsolete). The rest - a collection of cobbled-together figures based on averages; percentages of averages, and percentages of percentages.

Imagine the following scene: Following an intensive ONS investigation into property price statistics, ALL other indicators are ditched in favour of one released by Nutt & Co - a small West-Country Agent with a register of 25 properties. The ONS concluded that Nutt & Co's previous monthly statistics were the most accurate of any.

SO...

Month #1 - Nutt & Co listed 2 new instructions at a total value of £284,750 - an average Asking Price of £142,375.
They handed keys over on 3 sales worth £348,860 completed - an average Sales Price of £116,287

Month #2 - only 1 new instruction... but at an Asking Price of £395,000.
2 sales worth £205,000 completed - average Sales Price £102,500.

Which headline do you think will make it to press -

Houseprices rise by 277% in a month!! or

HOUSE PRICE CRASH! 13% WIPED OFF VALUES NATIONWIDE!

I'll put my pound on the latter - for what my opinion is worth...

• 18 October 2010 10:21 AM

This article highlights the stupidity of so many EA. The chance to change for the good wasted, Vendors were just getting the message!

They don’t realise how pathetically bad many agents are and trust them to try a loony price that probably ruins their change of ever selling at all, let alone at a decent, all be it a lower price. Shame on you lot, no wonder the public hate us, they are right in so many instances and they don’t know half of it!

• 18 October 2010 10:09 AM

This as an increase in the average asking price, isn't it? An average over all the houses newly-listed on RM?

If less houses are being listed at lower price points, possibly because the owners feel that their buyer base is eroded, and there won't be buyers who can get finance, then the listings will be weighted toward more expensive property, and the average price goes up.

• 18 October 2010 10:03 AM

Ho refreshing that a PROPER agent, independant that is, tells it like it is and voices the same opinion other PROPER agents are thinking. The usual suspects are to blame and you all know who you are! Stop giving out such blatantly bad advice to so many sellers in so many areas. You only reap what you sow!!

• 18 October 2010 10:01 AM

"Mark"

I must say I am in excatly the same position as yourself, an Ex Corporate Manager and have now set up on my own and happily quoting realistic market figures to help sell the properties we offer!

Can I also add that I'm tired of seeing these useless comparisons on house prices.

Halifax, I should imagine, draw their figures from mortgages completed or agreed in any given time period. Not only does this fall foul to the fact that one month they could have completed on slightly higher mortgage amounts compared to the previous month but they could have also had more mortgages complete/been agreed in different areas of the country than the previous month!

The other lenders report different amounts also... what a suprise!

Then the comparison is drawn up against Rightmove's report.... Which is based on actual Marketing prices not sold figures!

It's not even worth reporting... do we need anymore confusion in this already confused and depressed economy...!?

• 18 October 2010 09:58 AM

These figures just back up what I am seeing in the town I work in. Asking prices and property values are distant relatives. An overpriced unsold property is a liability and a drain on costs.

• 18 October 2010 09:56 AM

Or, are we simply seeing the obvious kickback from the sudden removal of HIPs which prevously kept the market chancers away. "Go on Mr Vendor, put your house on the market. It aint gonna cost ya!"

• 18 October 2010 09:54 AM

Oh come on, give the Corporates a break here. These poor, poor valuers, who have bosses that never do any ACTUAL work pursuing them remorselessly to hit totally unrealistic targets whilst simultaeously asking them to fill in endless spreadsheets and write numerous reports, all taking up the time they could have spent ACTUALLY DOING THE WORK TO HIT THEIR TARGETS. These poor, poor valuers have to find SOME WAY to put houses on the market. Oh, I know, let's overvalue them and then let the negotiators deal with trying to get price reductions in the furture to make the houses even vaguely salesable. (yes, unless you haven't guessed it, I am an EX-corporate agent who has thankfully set up on his own so he can run his business as a PROPER agency, haha)

• 18 October 2010 09:44 AM