If you have come to the conclusion to sell your investment property, you will need to give thought to who you should use as an agent, should you appoint a sole agent or multiple agents? Should you use a large or small agent? There are lots of things to consider when selling your property.
Make sure you have already done your own research as to what the price of your apartment is likely to be and make sure you are fully aware of all the costs involved in selling the property.
Once you’ve made your decision to sell, your decisions around which agent to use are likely to centred around the following:
Large or small agent?
In our opinion you should go with the agent you feel most comfortable with. There are some very good local independent agents who are small and will do as good a job, if not better, than a large agent. They are likely to be heavily involved in the local community and have their finger on the pulse of domestic buyers.
No matter whatever anyone tells you, buyers for your property will come from the local area. It does not matter how good their website is there is no wealthy Asian investor looking at your property.
Sole agent or multiple agents?
Look at property portals to see who is promoting units in your development and speak with them. In our experience with re-sales it is generally the smaller agents who perform much better than the big agents, who may well be conflicted with also selling brand new units for the developer.
If you can, try and pay a fee slightly more than the typical market fee, or provide an incentive for performance. Unless you really know an agent well, we suggest you appoint either two agents or a multiple agents. This works particularly well if you are paying a competitive fee – competition tends to create better performance.
Marketing Costs
You should absolutely not be paying significant costs for promoting your property. If your agent is asking for payment, ask them to confirm they are not earning a commission on the cost of promoting your property. The reality is that having a website or being active on a portal such as Rightmove or Zoopla is a cost of them doing business.
Agent Fees
Try to be creative. You do not need to simply have a straight commission, why not incentivise the agent with a creative fee structure? You can do this by offering a higher fee if the agent achieves an agreed price or higher, or you might incentivise them with additional fees if certain timeframes are met – this can work well if you are in a rush to sell.
Fees will differ between locations, so do your research and shop around to find out the average in your local area first.
We hope you have found this article useful, feel free to comment or ask any questions. For more information on about property investment check out our other articles and request your copy of our Buyers Guides from [email protected].
Important notice: Proptech Pioneer and its associated companies seeks to provide investors with guides, information and tools, but we cannot guarantee this information to be accurate or perfect. You use the information at your own risk and accept no liability if you rely on this information. Proptech Pioneer is not a tax advisor, conveyance, lawyer, financial advisor or mortgage advisor. You should seek independent advice from independent professionals before making any investment decision
