With Christmas now upon us and the key selling period fast approaching we’re often asked when is the best time to advertise a house for sale..

For reasons best known to them, our friends at the country’s largest property portal have in recent years pushed Boxing Day as a time for peak searches and agents have joined in the fun with lining-up property ads to go live just as the Boxing Day sales get into swing.

The reality however is quite different as the majority of the country are otherwise involved in hosting family, dealing with the remains of the Turkey, and summoning up energy for another last hurrah on New Years Eve. In other words, having a normal Christmas instead of hurriedly packing everything away to greet prospective buyers.

There’s no getting away from the fact that the first months of the year have replaced spring as the peak time to come to market, but rushing a property to market over Christmas could actually be of detriment to your chances of securing a buyer as the all important launch gets missed by your potential buyer who was instead stressing over the custard not setting on the trifle!

Launching a property to market is really important. Just putting up a board and waiting for the phone isn’t enough! You need to have all your ducks in a row and you want to launch it at a time when you get the maximum number of people viewing the ad, so choose a time when they’re not busy with family, queueing for a Boxing Day bargain, or trying to book their summer holidays….

Think about your buyers too – you might be one yourself. When you’re searching for a house, you want to see a degree of choice. Jumping-in two footed into the first house that pops-up isn’t probably where you’re at – particularly in a tricky market. You’ll want to see some choice and that doesn’t normally happen until the middle of the month when the decs have been packed away, the little jobs have been attended to and people are ready to start their hunt.

At that point you need to be ready for action. You need viewing slots already agreed, the cleaner booked, and if you’re selling something tenanted you need your tenants on board ready for viewers.

If you’re contemplating selling in the New Year and you’d like an honest opinion – without the waffle, drop us a line. Granger & Oaks are a small local agent in Carrington. We don’t list hundreds of homes, but we have a knack of selling pretty much everything that we advertise .

If you want a more personal service, call us today on 0115 9629770 if you’d like to find out more?