Minimum estate agent fees

Merlin5

Merlin5

Merlin5

Soldato
Joined
17 Aug 2009
Posts
18,752
Location
Finchley, London
Going to be selling my mum's retirement flat, I was wondering what the minimum agent fee is that I could negotiate. Do you think half a percent would be really taking the pee? We believe the flat should sell between £270k and 300k. Even if we sold at £270k, 0.5% commission is still £1350 which is decent as we all know agents are a bit of a ripoff anyway. I should know, I used to work at one in the 1980s :p

But it's been a long time since then. Or do you think they might go for 0.75%? And of course, sole agency would help swing it.
 
Purple bricks ended up selling my flat in Brighton. The fee is an instruction fee rather than a sale fee, so you have to pay them regardless of outcome, however they were lots cheaper and from a distance provided the same service as a local agent.

You may be able to get a better deal with a local agent, depends on your negotiating skills. The advantage with a local agent is that they often have a client base already and may have a few people actively looking for retirement homes on their books.
 
Yeah, maybe in the current situation they may be more desperate too, with less people looking to move and sell.
 
Doubt you’ll get fees that low on a property of that value from a traditional agent.

Marvt74 said:
Not worth trying a fixed fee online place?

Everyone just uses Rightmove these days anyway.
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This, all the agents round me wanted 1.5%+VAT or more which equates to well over £2k+ VAT.

Took a punt on purple bricks and it sold a few weeks later and ultimately got smack bang in the middle of what the three local agents said.

Right move did a all the heavy lifting at the end of the day.
 
Marvt74 said:
Not worth trying a fixed fee online place?

Everyone just uses Rightmove these days anyway.
Click to expand...

You mean I should advertise it on rightmove without involving an agent? How much do rightmove charge?


tom_nieto said:
Purple bricks ended up selling my flat in Brighton. The fee is an instruction fee rather than a sale fee, so you have to pay them regardless of outcome, however they were lots cheaper and from a distance provided the same service as a local agent.

You may be able to get a better deal with a local agent, depends on your negotiating skills. The advantage with a local agent is that they often have a client base already and may have a few people actively looking for retirement homes on their books.
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Purple bricks worries me a bit. The concept is good but I'd prefer no sale no fee. What sort of percentage of your sale price would you say purple bricks fee equated to?
 
Merlin5 said:
You mean I should advertise it on rightmove without involving an agent? How much do rightmove charge?
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Sorry, no i meant If you go Purple Bricks or a local agent they'll both stick it on Rightmove and that's where i imagine 99% of the audience is anyway. I don't see an Estate Agent doing much more than that.

Purple Bricks is £999, i'm sure it used to be a lot less than that. Given the current climate, i might actually be more inclined to pay extra once a sale goes through, if you can find an agency to accept something around the £1800 mark.
 
Why does the % matter? It’s basically irrelevant, all that matter is how much you actually pay in £ and pence.

Agents use the % so the actual cost for the service is less visible to the client, classic sales tactic.


That’s a fair point about the current housing market though, a fixed fee agent will certainly carry more risk at the moment.

Not only from the risk the property doesn’t sell but also the agent going bust due to a lack of sales....
 
It’s the bit after a buyer is found where a good agent is worth paying for. Especially with a leasehold property.

your call but I wouldn’t touch an online agent - they get money for quite literally doing sod all. Like, literally sod all.
 
Don't go with purple bricks and don't use any online solicitors . Get some local agents round and quote , paying them a few k could mean you keep your buyer when things get a delay . The estate agent don't get paid untill the house is sold so they are happy make calls to push things along.
 
Merlin5 said:
Purple bricks worries me a bit. The concept is good but I'd prefer no sale no fee. What sort of percentage of your sale price would you say purple bricks fee equated to?
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I think I paid £800. That equated to 0.27% of the sale price. The headline figure was very good.

No sale no fee is fine, but you want to sell, so you’ll end up paying a fee regardless.

I would echo the sentiments of not using an online solicitor. Find one through word of mouth. We went with the agent recommended solicitor when we bought the place and they were based hundreds of miles away and were terrible. We switched to a solicitor who was well known to our family thereafter and the process was much smoother and efficient.

Once you have the buyer, the agent has done their job. The real leg work should be done by the solicitor. EAs in my experience tend to meddle and get in the way. A good solicitor is worth their weight in gold and I would be spending money on them rather than insisting on an EA with a local office.

It entirely depends on what you want to do, but for selling I think I would use a fixed fee EA again.
 
Yep, I'm not doing online solicitors or purple bricks.

As far as a solicitor, we've got one. The thing is, my mum took out an equity share contract years ago which unfortunately means the profits are not all ours.

The solicitor that is the appointed executor and currently dealing with the will and probate was involved in the original equity contract. So it makes sense for them to do the conveyancing.

But I've asked them to let me have a quote for the conveyancing which I'll have soon. If it's too much I'll have to reconsider. What would you say is a reasonable amount? Shouldn't conveyancing be in the region of around £800? We don't want to pay much more as the solicitor has quoted £2500 + vat just for doing the other probate work.
 
I paid £650 for my sale last year but that was a straight forward sale with no additional factors, you'll likely have to pay extra due to the things you have listed.
 
fastwunz said:
It’s the bit after a buyer is found where a good agent is worth paying for. Especially with a leasehold property.

your call but I wouldn’t touch an online agent - they get money for quite literally doing sod all. Like, literally sod all.
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An agent can't help in the slightest with most of the issues that delay leasehold transactions.

Traditional agents get more money for also doing sod all. 90% of the time agents do nothing to assist and actually end up slowing things down and causing extra stress for everyone involved by trying to organise completion dates to suit their bonus timescales not what is actually possible and wanted by the people involved. The very occasional times they are worth having are good but I don't see why anyone would pay their standard fees.
 
I've been quite happy with purplebricks as a buyer. Granted my sale hasn't gone through yet, but the experience has been good.

All estate agents do is stick some adverts up and arrange viewings, I don't know why you'd pay a % for it. The online booking system that purplebricks is vastly better than faffing around with phone calls.

It's your solicitors that make the sale happen, not the estate agent at the end of the day.
 
fastwunz said:
your call but I wouldn’t touch an online agent - they get money for quite literally doing sod all. Like, literally sod all.
Click to expand...

I can't see how that is any different to a local/motar & bricks agent? All an EA does is pay a photographer to take some photos, they put together a "brochure" for the property and then just field calls for viewings and very very basic questions. Does an online agent require the vendor to provide photographs of the property? If so, then essentially all you're paying for with a local EA is for the photography.
 
Purple Bricks will come and view the property, measure and photograph it etc. Can’t say about the others.

There is a lot of talk about PB on here but there are loads of others.
 
Semple said:
I can't see how that is any different to a local/motar & bricks agent? All an EA does is pay a photographer to take some photos, they put together a "brochure" for the property and then just field calls for viewings and very very basic questions. Does an online agent require the vendor to provide photographs of the property? If so, then essentially all you're paying for with a local EA is for the photography.
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Someone told me today that photographers won't be allowed in to properties. The homeowner will be asked to take pics. If that's true, it's a good way for me to get their fee reduced. This is from a Guardian article today:

'John Coleman, agency director for GSC Grays, in Yorkshire, says they will not be sending their staff to do viewings of any occupied properties. “We will be providing our vendors with everything they need to do it themselves … we’ll be advising them to open doors and put on lights in advance and, where possible, to be outside,” he says.'

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2...rket-catches-estate-agents-on-hop-coronavirus
 
Most of the agents around my area take pretty crap photos using cameras that pre-date megapixels. I'd rather take them myself with my phone they will be 100 times better.
 
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