Has anyone sold their home at auction?

Thanks MOnica, and I do appreciate all of your comments. I checked Knight Frank out, unfortunately their Newcastle office is commercial only.

I'll keep going, I feel a bit overwhelmed at the moment.

Ah, finally looked at it and as everyone says, it is lovely. I even found it online, not on Rightmove, but on Prime Location, a Rightmove for more expensive houses, except that these days every agent, no matter how upmarket they are puts all their properties on Rightmove, even if they are on Prime Location as well. The number of potential house buyers starting a house search with Prime Location, is very small and those going on to it from Rightmove, probably less. At any price level they start with Rightmove.

Looking at your current agent's site, she obviously sees herself as an upmarket agent, she even uses the word 'boutique' as in 'boutique properties'. I am always suspicious of anyone who gives their business airs and graces, particularly when they are selling houses and consider themselves too boutique and upmarket to be on Rightmove.

It is a beautifully designed site, but when I typed Warkworth into the 'Search postcode/location box' the search facility told me that it had no properties for sale in Warkworth . In fact there are quite a lot. Searching by price was more successful.

I would research which are the big Newcastle estate agents, especially those dealing with bigger properties, Knight Frank have a Newcastle office, they will charge more, but provide a better service.

You have a really remarkable house, when you said converted railways station, I was expecting quite a modest house, certainly nothing as grand as yours. Your house needs to be on Right move and it needs to be with an agent that can give it national coverage. There is someoneout there that will snap up your house, but they may not be living locally.

But, and it is a big but. The housing market is very slow at the moment. Call it the Brexit factor if you wish, but I live near Oxford and we have houses, sensible priced that have been on the market for a year, people are just not buying at present.

not rash at all, some of us need to move on, get on with life. Life is too short as us widows know. I dropped mine by 11% and it sold very quickly

The EA's website is almost impossible to navigate around; almost as though actually selling properties is the least of what they offer. Agree with others who suggested a better EA for such a niche, and very beautiful property.

Bit rash to drop the price before using another agent / different advertising!

Thank you to everyone for your input, it is much appreciated.

I have taken all of your very helpful comments on board, I've clarified where the house is advertised, and dropped the price by 10% yesterday. Off to Homebase to find the draught excluders later!

Good luck to everyone house selling or hunting.

Off to the beach now with my dog - hopefully won't get hailed on today!

My property is on the market but I have an advantage in that I have bought and sold several properties in the last few years. My OH leaves all business worries to me so I have had to rise to the occasion. Experience has taken much of the fear and mystic out the process. You have to be completely realistic particularly about the price. If you go to auction after it has been on the market for a long time that sends out a clear message of a desperate need to sell and that will reflect in the price. That’s fine if you can afford to lose a lot of money.
I read HildaW’s reply and considered it very wise and practical.
If you feel that you are using the right EA then fine but make them work. All firms are slightly different and be aware of who does what in your firm of choice. In my case the main partner I deal with is incredibly experienced and dedicated but his IT skills are not great and that is done by others. I type in different aspects of my property into Google and if the search engine doesn’t bring my property up then I’m on the phone to the girls in the office to tell them. And they do rectify it. After all the firm has a vested interest in selling my property. Also I check the photographs, sequence and presentation etc. If I can see an area for improvement I call in at these office and sit next to one of the staff whilst we work out ways of improvement. I could sit back and leave it to them but by being involved l feel in touch with the whole process.
Mine is not an easy property to sell and I recognise this. It went on the market in November and we have had 4 viewings. Everyone loves it but it’s quirky. Raising the money was a problem for two of them, the third were just lookers and the fourth was yesterday so I haven’t had feed back yet from EA. The viewing couple said there was a lot to think about which is fair comment.
Mosaicwarts my heart goes out to you. You are coping with bereavement, unfamiliar business dealings and property maintenance. Not easy but you’re doing well. At least here you can discuss it relatively dispassionately.
Good luck and keep posting.

Right near a beach too...
I can see why your children want you to keep it.
It's quirky...just my style.

I could happily pay to stay there for a few weeks. The house looks hugely interesting and I could imagine sitting in the sunshine on the platform with a few cushions and a good book waiting to wave at passing trains.

Good heavens I’ve found it

Beautiful property. Around where I live (very affluent SE market town) that would go for about £1.5 mil!

You just get a floor plan done or via an EA. Floor plan is key

Could someone put me out of my misery! I can’t find the property. What page is it on?

Thank you for all of your feedback, it is all very interesting. My children are very upset we have to sell the house, and I can't discuss it easily with them. They do appreciate that I cannot afford the bills and maintenance - unfortunately my husband's pension plans were affected by his medical retirement and my finances are not as we imagined.

I've heard back from Railway Station Cottages today and it is £80 to advertise with them for the year - compared to the £84 I paid for one advert in Railway Magazine. Thanks for the reminder MOnica, they did remember my property and were pleased to hear from me.

Off to the beach with my lovely dog, have a good day.

Well now, I tried putting some searches into Google.

Assumption: I want to move to Northumberland. I want an individual property.

I tried several combinations of search words, like “Northumberland. Individual. Historic.”

In only one did your estate agent and your property come up. That was a very specific “Northumberland. Railway. Grade II.”

It was well down the page though. Lots of others before yours.

Oh no sorry, I see a phone number now, tucked away at the top.

I found it a very difficult website too. First of all I never knew it existed. Secondly, you don’t actually seem to be able to talk to anyone. It’s all “on the web” waiting for them to contact you as and when.

If I was coming up to view properties I’d need to phone and arrange a time to fit in with all the other viewings I wanted to make.

This is where Purple Bricks falls down too. All that backwards and forwarding by email trying to arrange a time.

I’ve been house hunting since last September and Rightmove is always my first point of call.

You definitely need a different agent. A hands on, available on the phone, national agent who will advertise in some of the glossy magazines.

Good luck!

I found station house but the EA website is beyond terrible, I suggest you get a new EA asap. Your property should sell quickly in the right hands. Assuming of course that this is your property

mosaic, you have had a lot of viewings, what has been the feedback? Your estate agent would have been ringing you after each viewing, surely

I've just had a look at the link to the website, and can't even see how to view the property, so that's not ideal. Also, can I ask, did you have 3 estate agents out to value the property before putting it on the market? I would always, as an ex estate agent advise people to do this, as it gives you a feel for a realistic price. I once valued an unusual property, and gave the owner a much lower selling price than either of the other agents who valued it. He asked me why, and I told him that I thought it was a fair price, he then told me that the other agents thought he could get about £30k more, so I said that if he would like to try it at that price I would happily give it a go, but would monitor it, after a few weeks he dropped the price, and we eventually got an offer £2k above the price I'd originally told him, which he accepted. However, when the surveyor went round, he found some problems, and the long and the short of it, is that he eventually sold it for the exact price I'd given him. So as someone else has already said, you shouldn't necessarily believe what agents tell you, as most will give you a high price just to get you on their books, and will then nag at you to reduce, reduce, reduce! I do hope you soon find a suitable purchaser, but unless you are completely desperate, wouldn't recommend the auction route, just get another couple of agents out, and get a more realistic price. As an aside, does the agent give you feedback on what the viewers have said about your property? If not, ask them to. Good luck and I hope you find the right purchaser VERY soon!

Thank you for reminding me of the railway website MOnica, lovely company, I used them years ago to advertise our self catering annexe, and have sent them an enquiry.

I am in Northumberland and couldn't find a specialist EA but will admit to not functioning and thinking as clearly as I should due to my grief.

Thank you MOnica for suggesting Jackson-Stops - unfortunately no branches up here. I'll have to have a look through the others in Country Life. My estate agent only takes 20 properties at a time - she was recommended by many local people who have both bought and sold with her.

www.thisispropology.co.uk/

Thank you all for your help, it is lovely of you to take the time to write.

grampie listed buildings do not require energy performance certificates and anyone buying the station will probably not be allowed to replace the windows. But as others have said this does not preclude putting in energy saving measures.

We live in a listed building, a farmhouse built in 1467, and cannot replace our windows, but we are allowed to install secondary glazing indoors and we have insulated the roof and some of the internal walls.

However, as I said before, properties like this are best sold through specialist agents, like the one I mentioned or the big upmarket national agents like Knight Frank and Jackson Stopps, who specialise in these kinds of niche buildings.

I would never try and sell a property like this through an ordinary High Street estate agent.

Even with a bog standard listed farmhouse like ours in an area where there are no lack of them. I would still be very selective about which local agent I placed it with. Many estate agents are completely out of their depth faced with an unusual or listed building.

Me too Annaram1
Built around 1820, high ceilings, deep skirtings and window seats etc plus single glazed original wooden window frames.
Luckily, no draught problems but anyway, I prefer cooler rooms.

Betwys Betws

I 'lived' at the railway station in Betwys-y-Coed ( N Wales) for two brilliant summers and one Christmas /New Year as a nanny for a 3 yr old when I was 16/17. Her daddy was divorced. It was a fantastic job in a beautiful area.
He had turned part of the station into a cafe and I made friends with the girl who ran the place who lived in Blaenau Ffestiniog.
Off topic...sorry. Brought back great memories.

Regarding the single glazed windows, I have those and because my property is 200 years old and listed grade 2 I can't double glaze them. I went to Homebase and bought some Draught Excluder, which covers 4 windows. Not the ordinary window film which they also sell, which covers widows so you cant see through them .

Thank you so much for all of your interesting replies, I am new to Gransnet and forgot to check this post this morning.

I have another viewing tomorrow, please keep your fingers crossed a) it doesn't hail stone again as the builder doing the gutter repair seems to have gone to Mars and b) they are the special person!