publication date: Sep 28, 2010
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author/source: Kate Faulkner, Property Expert and Author of Which? Property Books
Property Sale Price
Working out what the right property sales price is for your home whether you are seller or a buyer is essential in today’s tough property market conditions. One way to help you is to find the right price, is knowing where to look for property sales prices and which websites are worth looking at on-line.
Property sales prices are available on-line, but the first thing you need to know about them is that they are often very out of date. The reason for this is the data comes from the same source, the Land Registry, which records all the final sales prices of a property.
The final sales price of a property is recorded once completion has taken place, the seller has moved in and the legal company has registered the sale (and sales price) with the Land Registry. This data is released approximately one month after completions, so for example if you completed on your property sale in July, the data would be released at the end of August. Completion usually takes up to two weeks after exchange when the price is set, so the final property sales price is now at least six weeks out of date. Prior to this, if the final sales price is the same as the original offer price, that could be another six weeks or several months before exchange.
So it is worth assuming that the property sale price that appears on the Land Registry and the websites that buy their data are around three months out of date. This doesn’t mean that they aren’t worth looking at, they are incredibly useful.
For buyers, property sales prices allow you to check what the vendor bought the property for if it’s been bought since 1999. For sellers, it allows you to see what similar properties have sold for recently so you have an idea what your home might be worth.
Beware though that not all property sales price websites publish EVERY sold price. Some only buy a bit of the land registry data, some don’t buy all of the data, some publish it months after it has been released, some publish it as soon as it’s available.
So, when searching for property sales prices, Kate Faulkner, one of the UK’s top property consultants suggests "You must look at several websites to work out which offer the best information. We tend to use Rightmove and Mouseprice as well as Nethouseprices and finally Hometrack“.
Do you want expert help from Kate and her team at Designs on Property? If so consider buying Kate’s Sellers' Pack with a checklist of over 75 things to do and information about how to find out property sales prices.
Not sure what to do? If you need independent advice on selling in the UK, then contact Kate Faulkner and her team at Designs on Property by emailing enquiries@designsonproperty.co.uk or calling 0845 838 1763.
