As confidence returns to the UK housing market, Gocompare.com Home Insurance reveals the top 20 turn-offs for home-buyers. Damp is the biggest ‘no-no’ for potential buyers with 70% of buyers saying that they wouldn’t buy a property which had damp patches or stained walls or ceilings, while 63% said that they would avoid homes which were in a poor state of repair.
Bad housekeeping can also help to break a sale – putting off more would-be buyers than outdated décor or small rooms. Well over half (56%) of those surveyed said that they’d be turned off by a smelly house, while dirty rooms (37%), general untidiness (16%), overgrown gardens (16%) and cluttered room (15%) were also key influences in deciding whether to buy a particular property or not.
Here is the top 20:
1: Damp patches, stained walls and ceilings
2: Property in poor state of repair e.g. rotten windows
3: No garden
4: Bad smells, including odours from pets, cigarette smoke, damp and food
5: No parking
6: Poor natural light, dark rooms
7: Unfinished building work
8: Small rooms
9: Small kitchen
10: Bad DIY
11: Dirty house
12: Stone cladding, render or pebble dash on outside walls
13: Outdated bathroom
14: Outdated kitchen
15: Artex or textured ceilings
16: Plastic windows
17: Overgrown garden
18: General untidiness
19: Cluttered rooms
20: Dated or over the top décor
Ben Wilson, from Gocompare.com home insurance highlighted that buying a home is one of the biggest financial commitments many of us will make and most potential buyers will want to think that the property they are buying has been looked after by its current owners.
Ben added:
“Overgrown gardens, grubby, cluttered rooms can be tell-tale signs that the property has been unloved and essential maintenance and repairs have been ignored. For example, stained walls and ceilings or rooms with a mildew smell could warning signs of a possible damp problem which might be costly to remedy – or they might simply be a result of blocked gutters or downpipes which are quick, easy and inexpensive to clear.
So, one of the cheapest and most simple ways to help ensure a successful sale is to make sure that before you put your home on the market, it is clean, fresh smelling and tidy.”
