What turns off a potential house buyer?

A new survey from Harron Homes has uncovered the greatest factors that prevent buyers from going ahead with a purchase – and they’re surprisingly common.

For most of us, selling a house is about maintaining a certain showroom quality for our homes at the off-chance a potential buyer shows up at short notice. It’s also a no-brainer to ensure that any pictures of the property are illustrative and detailed, allowing the buyer to imagine themselves living there. The urge to maintain a ‘sellable’ property, however, is an ideal that is less prevalent amongst sellers than most people expect.

The key point to be learned from the survey by Harron Homes is that nearly half of all buyers decide whether or not they want to purchase a property within the first five minutes of a viewing, so first impressions are incredibly important. So how are people getting it so wrong?

When viewing a property through an online portal such as Rightmove or Zoopla, the greatest turn-off is low quality or a poor selection of photos – mainly because it raises more questions about the house than it answers, after all, what are they trying to hide? Nearly half of all respondents also found the lack of a floor plan to be a key point that dissuaded them from investigating further.

If they do investigate further and arrange a viewing, there are further factors that can deter a potential buyer. For those who own a car, parking is a clear necessity but a vast majority of homes do not have readily available parking, or simply share a driveway with a neighbour – often an issue that can’t be helped. From an aesthetic point of view, old-fashioned facades can also heavily affect opinion – decorations such as pebble-dash walls no long entice buyers the way they did 30 years ago.

Inside the average property, many of the respondents found themselves wary of the presence of dampness, despite its pervasiveness throughout a large number of older properties across the UK. For over 50% of those surveyed however, the smell of dampness is the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

While decorations such as Artex ceilings and outdated fittings are major drawbacks, it’s not always the house itself that’s the problem. For many, being followed too closely by the vendor as they tour a home is a big turn-off, as they feel the seller is attempting to distract them from faults within the property.

If you can’t afford to make too many changes to your property before you put it on the market, there are property buying companies who are happy to look past outdated interiors and a lack of cleanliness and offer you a fair price in cash to aid a fast house sale.

Why doesn’t anybody want to buy my house? Why not ask National Homebuyers for advice, as we buy any house. Call 08000 443 911 or request a call back to find out how much you could get for your property