Following the government’s decision to enter into a third and hopefully final lockdown, house sales have, unfortunately, been hit hard yet again.
About our guest blogger:
Dakota Murphey has experience in property management with her portfolio of properties expanding in the South of England. Her passion for renovation and home improvement projects is shared through her writing to help educate and inspire others.
Not only are home viewings becoming more and more difficult to arrange, but also with more people now needing to stay at home to avoid infection, there are a reduced number of interested parties as well.
What’s more, for homebuyers who had agreed to purchase prior to the lockdown, there is now predicted to be significant delays to the sale process, largely thanks to surveys, contractors, conveyancing searches and more becoming difficult to organise within the government’s restrictions.
Therefore, it’s important for you – their estate agent – to support and reassure these homebuyers fully throughout this uncertain time, regardless of where they might currently be in the sales process.
So, with this in mind, we thought we’d compile a quick guide on how to do exactly that, helping you to put the homebuyer’s mind at ease prior to their date of completion.
Keep In Regular Contact
Whether your homebuyer is a first-time buyer or has bought hundreds of houses before, it’s important to keep in regular contact with them to ensure everything is still in order.
Put yourself in their shoes, for instance. They are investing hundreds of thousands of pounds into a process that you are encouraging them to follow through on.
As such, you need to keep them updated along the way and make sure any questions or queries they have are answered as quickly as possible.
Whether it be an enquiry over a survey-related matter, like how carbon-friendly the property is, or something a lot more general, like how long the entire process is likely to take, don’t allow weeks to go by without contacting them. Otherwise, they could start to fret and eventually pull out of the sale, which wouldn’t be good for either of you.
Keep COVID-Secure
If your buyer wants to revisit the property they’re interested in buying but are nervous about how COVID-secure it will be, try to put their mind at ease.
Whether it be the property they’re buying, the estate agency you work for, or the removals company you recommend, it’s important to remember that the coronavirus pandemic is at the front and centre of everyone’s minds right now.
Therefore, you need to help reassure them that each aspect of the move you involve yourself with is kept COVID-secure, to keep the risk of infection as low as possible.
Maintain Social Distancing
While on the topic of keeping viewings, surveys and some of the more physical aspects of the home move COVID-secure, maintaining social distancing is imperative.
It may be perfectly natural to want to follow the buyer around answering any questions they might have but, without sticking to the social distancing guidelines, you could end up putting both you and them at risk.
The last thing you want, after all, is for either you or them to be out of action due to infection. Therefore, it’s imperative to do all you can to avoid contact where possible; you could even simply provide them with a sanitised key to access the property themselves.
Stay Organised
As you should well know, there are a lot of hoops to jump through when it comes to moving house so keeping organised throughout is vital.
Therefore, while it may sound obvious, make sure you are doing all of the basic productivity traits to keep on top of everything.
Make lists, use a diary, write down notes, set reminders – in essence, the more you can do to stay organised, the easier the entire process will be to handle along the way, and the more at ease both your buyer and vendor will feel as a result.
Final Thoughts...
From minimising the spread of infection to ensuring home purchases go off without a hitch, there’s no denying that the coronavirus pandemic has brought with it a number of issues for estate agencies to address – especially in terms of keeping homebuyers onside.
However, by utilising the tips listed above, you can put your estate agency in the best possible position. Helping ensure that you will not only see the sale through to completion, but you will also put the mind of the buyer at ease in doing so.