When you put your home up for sale, you’re ready for viewings and offers to come flooding in. But it doesn’t always work that way.
While the average time between listing and selling a UK property is 59 days, more half of sales take longer than 10 months — and alongside a few other factors, location can play a big part.
According to new research from Sell House Fast, Aberdeen is the slowest-moving market across the country’s 50 biggest cities, with homes taking approximately 150 days – almost five months – to shift.
Here, flats, one-bedrooms and expensive properties languish longest, but price-wise, the sweet spot seems to be between £500,000 and £1 million, which speeds things up by 79 days.
Next on the list is Bournemouth at 143 days, Britain’s most ‘laid back’ spot where flats are hardest to sell and four-bedroom semi-detached homes go quickest, followed by London with a figure of 139 days.
This seems somewhat surprising given the capital is often seen as a real estate hotspot. However, London has a high proportion of luxury properties which are unaffordable for most and therefore less in demand, skewing the average.
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On the opposite end of the scale, homes fly off the market in Glasgow. This Scottish city boasts an average of just 36 days, with this sale time even lower for semi-detached and terraced homes, popular among young professionals and families.
The second and third fastest-selling spots were also north of the border, which Sell House Fast claims could be partly because solicitors are responsible for marketing – compared to England, where it is down to estate agents.
It also notes that in Scotland, ‘sellers typically provide a survey right at the beginning of the process, which the buyer can use to get their mortgage approved.’
The UK cities where homes take longest to sell
- Aberdeen – 150 days
- Bournemouth – 143 days
- London – 139 days
- Luton – 132 days
- Brighton and Hove – 130 days
- Cardiff – 124 days
- Hull – 122 days
- Portsmouth – 122 days
- Oxford – 120 days
- Southend-on-Sea – 118 days
Dundee residents are looking at just under two months to sell — a whopping 87% quicker in Aberdeen.
Similarly to the trends seen elsewhere, larger, detached homes are trickier to get rid of here, but if you have a terraced one-bedroom priced between £200,000 and £300,000 you’re in luck, as these features speed things up.
Meanwhile, over in Edinburgh, buyers snap up semi-detached houses, especially if they have two bedrooms, giving the city an overall sale time of 71 days or around 10 weeks.
The UK cities where homes sell fastest
- Glasgow – 36 days
- Dundee – 59 days
- Edinburgh – 71 days
- Northampton – 77 days
- Newcastle upon Tyne – 80 days
- Plymouth – 83 days
- Gateshead – 83 days
- Stoke-on-Trent – 84 days
- Swindon – 84 days
Throughout the country, the ‘perfect’ price range for a quick sale was found to be between £200,000 and £300,000, as houses in this bracket change hands up to 54% quicker.
As you can probably imagine, a price tag over £1 million may lead to delays (171 days to sell on average) but going cheaper can also be an issue. In fact, listings under £100,000 take more than a month longer to exchange compared to those closer to the national average.
In terms of property type, semi-detached and terraced are popular among buyers, with three-bedroom homes the most likely to land a swift sale.
Five-bedroom places typically spend a prolonged period on the market, possibly because there isn’t as much demand for larger homes, but one-bedrooms are equally sluggish sellers — worth keeping in mind if you plan to get on the ladder before upsizing down the line.
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