Should you move?

Should you move blogpost by AshdownJones estate agents in the Lakes and Dales

How do you decide if now is the right time for you

My friend Marissa has her house on the market.  It’s a beautiful home, a true Grand Design; all glass and chrome, with stylish touches and contemporary gadgets. It’s been for sale for a few months now, in an area where properties usually fly off the shelves, but hers hasn’t attracted any offers yet.  But it’s not the house that’s the issue.  Let me explain:

When you’re selling your home, you need to be fully motivated to move.  After all, there are a lot of hoops to jump through, and challenges to face, along the way.  From preparing your home for each viewing, to dealing with disappointing feedback, low offers and harsh surveyors’ reports, to putting your life on hold for months, and sometimes longer, until you finally get the keys to your new home.


Pain and desire

To have the energy to rise to these challenges, you really have to be determined to sell your house. Over the years we’ve met with hundreds of sellers, and we’ve identified two elements that have to be present in order to sell effectively: they are, pain and desire:

Pain – to sell your home, there must be a really strong reason why your house – once perhaps your dream home – is no longer right for you.  It could be that you have six children and only two bedrooms, or that your partner can’t manage the stairs any more.  Perhaps the garden has become too much of a worry, or simply that the house isn’t in the right location for a new job or school.  Whatever the reason, it has to be tangible, and you need to be able to express it. Without the pain of your current home, it’s very difficult to separate yourself emotionally from it enough to make the break and sell it.

Desire – where are you moving to? And why are you moving? Is it to be closer to family? Or to release some capital so that you can fulfill a lifetime dream of travelling, or buying a boat? Perhaps you have an amazing job offer, one that will offer you a better standard of living in your new home.  Or maybe you are longing for space; more bedrooms, walk-in wardrobe, ensuite bathroom and large garden. Your desire has to be achievable, and something to really get excited about for you to keep your eye on the prize.


Why are you selling?

We asked Marissa, why she is selling her beautiful home.  “Oh I just fancied a change,” she explained.

And where were they moving? “We haven’t decided yet, nothing has really grabbed me,” she replied.

Until my friend digs deep enough to find the pain in her current home, and then finds a dream home she can desire with all her heart, she’s going to find that buyers for her current home are scarce.  Once she finds her pain, and her desire, her buyer will surely magically appear.  After all, her home is someone else’s dream home. Just as her next dream home is out there waiting for her.


Do you want to move enough?

You’ve weighed up the relative practicalities of staying and adapting your current home, versus moving house, and it’s a close-run contest. You have calculated the costs and possible investment return of either option, and the differential is not great enough to make the call, definitively.

The question that remains is the most important and the least tangible: “Do I want to move, enough to do it?”

Some people find it easier to rely simply on their gut instinct, letting their intuition have the final say. For others, the decision is largely a logical and practical one. No matter where you are on the scale of intuition versus logic, the decision to move is ultimately made with emotion, from the heart.

Deciding whether or not to move home is often a difficult decision, largely because there is a feeling of having a mountain to climb if you do. Preparing your home for sale, meeting with relevant estate agents, trying to assess the best deal in terms of service, fee and valuation, then choosing images, signing off a brochure, having your EPC drawn up – and this is all before your property actually comes to market. No wonder it feels as if you’re about to embark upon a marathon.

But as with any arduous journey, finding the right guide can make all the difference. And that’s where we come in. Every week, we spend time with people who are trying to make the decision to move, or instead to stay. And because we’ve had 14 years of experience in helping people like them make the right decision, we know what to say to provide clarity and advice.

Moving home is not right for everyone, but it may be right for you. To have a chat over a cuppa and pick the best brains in the business on the subject, just pick up the phone. We’re waiting to hear from you.

Sam and Phil

team@ashdownjones.co.uk

015394 88811

Sam and Phil's logo