The “market value” of your home will be what it should be worth when you look at other houses in the area. A lot of homeowners make the mistake of not understanding their true property value before they put it on the market. As a result, you can easily sell your home for less than it should be worth – so how do you avoid this?
It’s all about recognising what your property is currently worth and whether or not this aligns with the market value. If it’s below the expected value, then you can make a few changes to boost the price back up and avoid losing a lot of money from the sale. Here’s what you need to do:
Get Multiple Proper Valuations
Visit multiple property valuers to see what your home is currently worth. They will inspect your property and look at the current market to determine how much you can reasonably list it for. This gives you a good starting point – and there are two key things that you can’t ignore:
- You must visit proper property valuers instead of doing this online using an app
- You must get multiple valuations so you can take an average price
You’ll now have a figure, but this doesn’t tell you if your home is currently worth less than the market value, which brings you on to step two.
Check Recent Property Sales In Your Area
Look for property sales in your area within the last year or so, but make sure you try to find homes with similar features to yours. E.g. If you’re selling a three-bedroom home with a decent garden, you need to see how much other three-bedroom homes with decent gardens sell for.
That’s where some people go wrong, as they compare their property to others on the same street that lack the features. So, your home could be valued at the same price as your next-door neighbour’s home that sold a few months ago, but their property had fewer bedrooms, fewer bathrooms and a smaller garden.
If your home is valued at the same price as smaller homes in your area, then that’s a problem. Likewise, if the valuation is less than similar homes, then that’s also a problem. This tells you that your home is definitely undervalued, which means there’s work to do.
Identify and Sort Out Any Problems
Why might your home be worth less than the market value? It could be down to any of the following:
- It simply doesn’t look that presentable
- It lacks key features that homeowners want (a modern bathroom/kitchen, energy efficiency, etc.)
- The garden is poorly maintained
- It needs multiple repairs, both big and small
- The entire interior design is outdated
These things are issues because buyers know they’ll have to put in a lot of work to turn your home into their dream home. Thankfully, you can make a few home upgrades or changes to boost the property value before you sell. Focus on cheap fixes and improvements that make your home more desirable, such as totally cleaning the garden, fixing a leaky roof, or even replacing old windows with more efficient ones.
Shy away from the big improvements – like renovating a kitchen/bathroom – and the money you invest in your small upgrades will translate to bigger profits when you sell. So, be sure you value your property and compare it with recent sales to know what it’s worth and where it stands before seeing if you need to make a few changes.
