Selling Property With Large Bills

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Many homeowners throughout the UK have large bills at their property, include council tax, utility bills, repairs, cleaning fees and more, and this can complicate their ability to sell their house or flat fast and for a competitive offer. This guide explains those potential difficulties and also offers guidance on how you may still be able to sell your home quickly for a fair price.

1. What does it mean to have large bills at your property?
2. How large bills might complicate the sale of a home
3. Reducing large bills before attempting to sell your property
4. Preparing your house or flat with large bills for buyers
5. Your options to sell your house with large bills
6. Top questions and answers about selling a property with large bills

What does it mean to have large bills at your property?

Homeowners in the UK will have many bills to pay on a recurring basis, even after they’ve paid to purchase a property. These expenses can range from relatively small through to expensive, up to hundreds or even thousands of pounds, and some owners may struggle to pay them.
Budgeting will likely be an important part of a buyers’ planning for whether or not they want to make an offer to purchase your home, as the website Which? explains. This likely includes prospective buyers asking about large bills at your home, and making them a factor in how they will assess your flat or house.
Examples of large bills at home can include, but are not limited to:

• Repairs
• Council tax
• Utility bills
• Mortgage payments
• Legal fees
• Ground rent
• Service charges
• Window cleaning
• House cleaning
• Gardening
• Home insurance

Whether the large bills are recurring monthly expenses that you are able to meet, or whether they are overdue bills like delayed mortgage payments, you could experience some problems in getting buyers interested when you’re trying to sell your property because of these charges.
Some of the fees listed above will only apply at leasehold homes, where you are the owner of a property for the number of years set out in a lease agreement that you sign with the freehold owner of the home. This agreement will also specify the cost of the ground rent and the service charges that you’ll pay the leaseholder, and potential buyers will want to know these costs.
As you’ll see in the next section of this guide, having large bills at your property can make it more difficult to get potential buyers interested. But there are some steps that you are still able to take that may improve your odds of getting a buyer to make a quick and fair offer.

How large bills might complicate the sale of a home

Depending on the type of large bill or bills that you have at your flat or house, you could find that it’s a top factor in making some potential buyers completely lose interest in the property.
That’s because large bills can sometimes be seen as the primary reason for why a home is struggling to sell, because someone that’s interested in the property could have major concerns.
If the large bills are arrears that you have accrued, such as delayed council tax or utility bill payments, the potential buyer could fear that they might have liability for paying off those debts once they become the property’s next owner. Even though such bills will typically remain the legal and financial liability of the current homeowner once they’ve moved out, this theoretical concern could be enough to make some buyers walk away from making an offer.
If the large bills are ongoing expenses, such as having to pay high window cleaning fees for a big home with many windows, then this might be too much of an expense for the buyer.
Ongoing expenses, such as electricity and other utility bills or council tax payments, should be a key consideration in a buyer’s budget, as the website HyperJar notes.
Buyers will likely have prepared a budget for purchasing your property that includes an estimate of their monthly mortgage payments, living expenses and various other costs. If they calculate that the recurring large bills at your property will be more than they can reasonably afford, this might be justification enough for them to no longer have any desire to purchase your home.

Reducing large bills before attempting to sell your property

Given some buyers’ concerns about owning a property that has large bills, one issue you should consider is whether you are able to pay off or reduce some of those charges before selling.
If you have one or more existing large bills at your home because of overdue payments, you should see whether it’s possible to obtain the necessary funds to pay off these bills. Even though liability for paying such bills will typically remain your legal responsibility after you sell your home, the very existence of an overdue large bill can deter some prospective buyers.
You could also look into whether it might be possible to reduce any ongoing charges, and there may be options available to you for negotiating a lower rate for future payments.
For example, it might be possible to get a discount on your council tax bill, as explained in an article by The Times. Securing a reduction in the council tax rate could help to make potential buyers more interested, as they would know they’ll pay a lower rate as the next homeowner.
But do not be alarmed that it will be impossible to sell your property if you’re unable to reduce any of the large bills or pay off any outstanding amounts, because you’ll still have methods available to sell it quickly – and possibly within a few weeks depending on what you choose.
As a later section of this guide explains in more detail, one such strategy would be contacting LDN Properties or any other honest quick home buying companies. These businesses are renowned for making fair and rapid offers to purchase almost any category of property, and that includes those homes that other may see as "problem" homes, including those with large bills. And they’re able to finalise the process of buying most houses or flats within weeks.

Preparing your house or flat with large bills for sale

Regardless of whether you are able to reduce your large bills before selling your property, there are some other steps you should take that can make the home easier to sell.
It might seem obvious to some owners, but taking time to clean your home and make it look in its best possible condition before selling can help with attracting more buyers. They’re far more likely to make an offer on a house or flat that looks well maintained and tidy compared to one that appears cluttered and has various problems such as missing roof tiles.
Some simple and zero-cost steps you can take inside the property include minimising clutter in each room, because this will help them to seem larger and more valuable to buyers. You should also clean to a high standard and, if you have any pets, tidy up after them and keep them locked away whenever buyers come to tour the interior and exterior of your home on viewings.
By way of example, if you own a smoker’s home then you should use air freshener and open up windows to help with reducing or eliminating any odour from cigarettes, cigars of pipes that might be lingering inside the property, because this smell could be a strong disadvantage for many prospective buyers.
There are also some relatively cheap or no-expense steps you can take to improve how the exterior of your home looks as well, as the website MoneySavingExpert notes.
If you have any kind of green space like a garden then you should mow and weed it to improve its appearance. Then assess the outside of your property and decide whether there are fixes you can make, such as replacing any broken grass or installing a new front door.
First appearances are crucial and the view that a potential buyer has when they first approach your property could play an outsized role in their decision on whether to make an offer.

Your options to find a buyer for your house with large bills

When you have made the decision to sell your property with large bills, you’ll next need to decide how to find a buyer. Generally your choices include selling to a quick home buyer, selling at an auction, selling on your own or selling through an estate agent.
There are clear benefits associated with some of these methods, such as being able to complete the sale of your home within a handful of weeks when you use a quick buyer. Other approaches have notable drawbacks, like having to pay commission when you sell with an estate agent or auctioneer, and this fee being taken out of the eventual selling proceeds.
To help you identify which method best suits your particular needs, you should start by writing down your main goals with the sale of your flat or house, including whether you can accept paying any fees, how long you are prepare to wait to sell and the price at which you want to sell. Then compare these facts against the specifics of the four different options outlined below, and you should be able to see which of the strategies is the closest match in your situation.

Selling to a quick home buyer

LDN Properties and other quick buyers will often be by far the speediest option for selling any type of leasehold or freehold house, flat or other residential property.
That’s because they can finalise the process of buying most homes within weeks, and that includes paying the owner the proceeds and exchanging contracts. They can move so quickly because they already have the funds needed to purchase your property, so there’s no waiting for many weeks or even months to get approved for a mortgage to cover that cost.
Quick buyers also have the advantage of not charging homeowners any commission to purchase their properties, which helps you with reducing your overall selling expenses. That compares very favourably to selling through an estate agent or auctioneer, where you will required to pay fees that are subtracted from the proceeds if they’re able to find a buyer.
A further benefit of selling to a quick buyer is that they’ll make competitive and fast offers to buy almost any home regardless of its age, condition, location, shape, size, type or any problems.
As well as buying and making offers on properties that have large bills, LDN Properties has made many wide-ranging purchases since launching in 2003, also including houses that have Himalayan balsam in the garden, flats with structural issues, storm damaged properties, flats without planning permission, homes that have solar panels, houses with survey problems, properties with rot issues, flats that do not have an Energy Performance Certificate, homes with a regulated tenancy and many other scenarios.
To give you additional security when selling to a quick buyer, you can ask them if they can prove they are members of The Property Ombudsman (TPO), which is an independent entity that writes rules to guard homeowners from fraud in the industry. All true TPO members must abide by these regulations, which offers extra protection when selling your flat or house.
You can visit TPO’s website to check the membership status of any quick buyer, and once there click on the tab marked Find a Member and then type in the name of a specific company. If they are genuinely registered with TPO, you’ll then be shown the company’s membership details. If you get zero results when searching for a specific quick buyer then they are not truly registered with TPO and you should not sell your home to them because it may be a scam.

Selling at an auction

With an auction, you’ll choose a reserve price – the lowest value at which you agree your property can sell – and then people will have a chance to place bids of ever-increasing prices on the home, with the top bid at the time the auction ends being deemed the winner and buyer.
Note that an auction is a binding legal agreement to sell your property that the winner can sue to enforce if you attempt to walk away from it after the auction. That’s why you need to calculate a reserve price that should still produce some profit from the sale, even after you have subtracted whatever amount of commission the auctioneer will charge on a successful sale.
The usual auctioneer will charge about 2.5 percent commission based on your property’s final auction sale price, and this is taken out of the proceeds immediately, adding to your costs. If you want to lower your expenses when selling your home then you should review other options, such as selling your property to a no-fee quick buyer or selling without any third party help.
Some auctioneers could be willing to set a lower rate of commission or have the winning bidder pay some of your fees, so you should ask individual auctioneers about this possibility.
The auctioneer charges the fee to cover the many steps of selling that they handle, from first creating and advertising a listing that describes your home and features photographs of the interior and exterior through to hosting the auction itself and overseeing a successful sale.
Selling through an auction is not a rapid process because there’s plenty of involved, including several weeks or longer between when you decide to sell your home this way and when the auction is held. Even if your property does sell at the auction, the buyer will have about 28 days to sign all the mandatory paperwork and finish the other steps to complete the purchase.
There are some instances where you might be able to negotiate with an auctioneer to set a shorter deadline for the buyer to do their tasks, so it’s always worth asking. Just note that other auctioneers may give the buyer even more time than 28 days, delaying the sale further.

Selling on your own

Selling without any assistance means that you’ll be responsible for handling all the tasks needed to find a buyer, including making a listing, advertising it, organising viewings and hearing offers from potential buyers, hopefully taking one to exchange of contracts.
The benefit of selling this way is that you will not be required to pay any commission to an auctioneer or estate agent for handling these tasks, which helps lower your costs. But this possible saving may be cancelled out by the other expenses that you’re likely to incur when selling with this approach, such as the price of advertising your property’s listing.
That’s why you should only think about this method if you have previously sold a home with large bills, or have a qualified friend or family member willing to help you sell for free.
It might also take more than a full year to sell your home this way, so if you’re looking to sell fast then you should consider other options. And a buyer could make an offer but then withdraw it and abandon the sale, and do so without any penalties if contracts haven’t yet been exchanged. This will delay the sale even further because you’ll have to start over with seeking a buyer.
As an alternative, you could sell your property to a no-fee quick buyer such as LDN Properties. You’d get the same zero-commission advantage of selling without any help, but a quick buyer will handle all the tasks and usually be able to finalise the purchase of a home within a few short weeks, so you’d not only get a sale without any fees but also one that happens much faster.

Selling through an estate agent

Another way to sell your home is using the services of an estate agent, who will take on the bulk of the work of finding a buyer – everything from preparing and advertising a listing through to scheduling viewings and then fielding offers from anyone interested in buying the property.
For doing all of these steps, the average estate will charge commission if they’re able to sell your home, usually within a range of 1.15 percent to 1.40 percent of the home’s sale price. This fee adds to your expenses and will be deducted from the sale proceeds right away.
This isn’t the swiftest approach to sell a house or flat because it can take many months or even more than an entire year. And a prospective buyer could always make an offer but then rescind it before the contracts have been exchanged, and they won’t face any penalties. You’d have to then restart the search for a buyer, which may extend the timeline by several months.
It’s possible that some estate agents might also not know the ideal ways to attract buyers to a home with large bills, which may indicate that they will struggle to sell your property. Therefore you should always ask individual companies about whether they have such experience, and avoid selling your property using the services of an estate agent who does not have it.

Top queries and answers about selling a property with large bills

Homeowners thinking of selling their house or flat may have some questions to ask, ranging from the condition needed before selling through to selling a large house. Here are some of the top questions we’re asked about selling a house with large bills:

Your top questions when selling a property with large bills