12th May 2023

Is it time for a spring (un)clean?

Spring is here, and with it, the expectation for many of us to get out the rubber gloves and start a deep clean of our entire homes to welcome in the fresher season and warmer weather. This is especially true for those who are interested in selling their property, where getting your property ready to sell is pretty much the first step most people take. For most sellers, it’s a given to spruce up your house and make any repairs in time for the estate agents to come and begin to market your property to an eligible buyer. But, if you don’t fancy having to put in the manual labour to simply sell your home, property auctions could well be the answer.

Property auctions are different to traditional private treaty sales routes in many ways, but one big difference is that you don’t need your abode to be show-home ready to take it to auction. SDL Property Auctions’ have repeatedly made the headlines with messy houses as they head to auction, and then inevitably bring in a decent profit, proving that you don’t need to spend hours seeing to every little nook-and-cranny staging your home to ensure a decent sale.

With traditional estate agency, many people choose to spend more money improving their home before they even look to put it on the market, and it’s actually regularly advised. Repairing things that might be detrimental to the sale, and replacing things such as light bulbs throughout the home as they complete their full declutter. Not only this, it’s well known that neutral colours make rooms appear bigger, so many go as far as to restore the paint in their homes to “greige” colours before thinking about listing the property. And even then, there’s the cost of professional photographers that many use to try and show their property at the best angle.

Of course, what can still come after all of this is long delays of selling properties; chains, long completion dates and fall-throughs. In fact, at least 31% of property sales fell through before completion last year, a risk that is minimised massively by auctions, which have less than a 1% fall through rate.

Speed is one of the main factors to why people choose to auction; there is simply no faster way of selling. Auctions have a specific and intense marketing period of around four weeks, which ends with ten minutes or less of bidding on auction day. Once the gavel has gone down, the property is sold and the contracts are exchanged. No further negotiation is permitted, and the completion is set for less than a month later.

The fact that you don’t have to spend any more time simply cleaning your home for the next person to occupy just adds to the speediness – in the UK, it takes an average of around eight hours to fully clean a three-bedroomed house with a family bathroom… and that’s without the added extras of an intense deep clean. When heading to auction, there is no show-home cleaning necessary to await the pictures to advertise your home. And the best part is, properties that require renovation or have any potential to add value always sell well at auction too, so you may even make a little more money for doing a little less before auction day!

Don’t just take our word for it, here are some of our upcoming properties that could undoubtedly use a little TLC.

This apartment in a sought after area of Edgbaston in Birmingham is lot 1 in our May auction and has already seen plenty of interest. It has a guide price of £39,500-£55,000.

Also in need of refurbishment, with garage and gardens to the front and rear, this three bedroomed end terrace property in Bacup has a guide price of £75,000+.

To sell your property fast and faff-free, you shouldn’t have to faff around spring cleaning!