Quick navigation
If you are thinking about selling your top floor flat, there are some important details to learn before seeking a buyer, including the potential pros and cons that people might associate with your specific type of property and more. This guide discusses those factors and also provides suggestions on how you might be able to better attract a speedy and competitive offer.
- Making the decision to sell your top floor flat
- Benefits to buyers of owning a flat on the top floor
- Downsides associated with selling a top floor flat
- Preparing your top floor flat when trying to sell it
- Your options to sell a top floor flat
- Selling a top floor flat: frequently asked questions
Making the decision to sell your top floor flat
Owning a flat on the top floor of a block of flats or any other type of building has its benefits and drawbacks, and it’s important to know what these are when you’re trying to sell your home.
Top floor flats are sometimes – but not always – referred to as penthouse flats, but that latter category of property usually refers to a higher end home. By contrast, a top floor flat is a broad term that covers any leasehold flat that is located on the top floor of a building. There might be other flats in the property on lower floors, or it could be the only flat in the building.
You can find top floor flats in almost any part of the UK, although they tend to be more common in cities that have blocks of flats or flats situated above commercial premises, for example in a city centre. But they can also be found in suburbs, rural locations and more.
If you are looking to sell your top floor flat, this guide explains in the detail the various pros and cons that potential buyers might associate with the property and how that could affect your ability to sell the home.
You’ll also be given information about your typical options available for attracting buyers, including advice on the best strategies to maximise your chance of getting a fair and fast offer.
Benefits to buyers of owning a flat on the top floor
When you are looking to sell your top floor flat, the good news is that there are a number of factors that make this type of property more attractive to buyers than other homes, as detailed by Magic Bricks.
Learning about the various advantages of a top floor flat can be helpful when you’re attempting to generate interest in your property because you can focus on promoting these aspects. Just note that the benefits listed below might not all apply to your individual flat.
No noise from above: Top floor flats by their definition do not have any units above them, which means that you don’t have to worry about noise from upstairs neighbours bothering you. This can be a major incentive for someone to make an offer on your property, particularly if they have previously lived in a flat where they had to endure noisy neighbours above them.
Getting a great view: Because a top floor flat is at the highest point of the building in which it is located, this means it will have better views of the surrounding area compared to flats that are situated on lower floors. If your property is located within a neighbourhood that has plenty to see then this superior view might be a reason why someone views your home more favourably.
Safer than street level: Some prospective buyers might see a top floor flat as being safer than units on lower floors of the building, particularly on the ground floor, because those could be easier for burglars or vandals to enter. This perceived additional safety may help to make the difference between someone making an offer on your flat or losing interest in it.
Downsides associated with selling a top floor flat
As the previous section of this guide explains, there are a number of reasons for why someone looking to buy a home could have a greater interest in a top floor flat than other properties. But this type of flat can also have some downsides that sellers should be informed about.
For example, flats have service charges, as Chancellors notes, that leaseholders contribute to for general upkeep of the building, and these can sometimes be very expensive and might be beyond the budget for certain buyers looking at your flat.
Having a knowledge of these potential drawbacks can be useful in understanding why you might be facing some challenges in getting buyers interested in your flat. Issues can include:
Leaking from the roof: A major concern for some prospective buyers could be that they are worried about potential rain or storm damage, given that your flat is at the top of the building and therefore directly exposed. There are many top floor flats that have suffered leaks because the roof is poorly maintained, and this worry may be enough for some buyers to lose interest.
Disputes over repairs: If your flat is one of several within the building, there might be a situation where the roof of the property is damaged and needs repairing, which will cost money. Some leaseholders in lower floor flats may not be willing to pay toward these repairs, as they only affect the top floor flat, and some buyers may try to avoid ending up in such a situation. This legal situation can be understood by looking carefully at your leasehold contract to understand who exactly is responsible for paying for such repairs.
No lift in the building: Sometimes you’ll find a top floor flat, potentially several floors high, in a building that does not have a lift and therefore the property is only accessible by taking many stairs. For any buyers that are disabled or otherwise have mobility issues, this could make it impossible to purchase your flat.
Preparing your top floor flat when trying to sell it
An important part of the process of attempting to sell your top floor flat is making it presentable for buyers.
First impressions count when you are trying to get people interested in making an offer on your home, and this starts with the exterior of your property. Because your flat is part of a larger building, you are somewhat limited in what you can do to improve the outside appearance of your flat – but there are still a few options available that should cost little or no money.
If you have any broken windows then you can replace them, and the same applies for giving your window frames a fresh coat of paint. And if you have access to any shared yard, garden or green space at your building then you could consider mowing and weeding it. All of this work may make the home seem better maintained and more valuable to potential buyers.
Inside the flat, you should ensure that it is clean and that you have removed as much clutter as you can from all of the rooms as this will make the home seem more spacious and therefore worth a higher price. If you have any pets then you need to tidy up after them and keep them locked away when people come to tour the interior and exterior of your flat during viewings.
Separate from these relatively straightforward tasks, you might need to think about investing in repair work at your flat if it currently has some type of large-scale structural problem.
These issues can include a leak in the ceiling, damp, dry rot, the presence of asbestos, high levels of radon and many other scenarios. When buyers are made aware of a problem, they might reduce their offer for the flat by the amount of money that they think it will cost them to fix the issue as the home’s next owner. By resolving such flaws before selling you can prevent this from happening and therefore hopefully attract a better offer from prospective buyers.
But there are many top floor flat owners that will lack the funds, time or even interest in launching repair work before selling, given that it could take many months and be very expensive, as Landlord Today explains. If this applies to your situation then rest assured you will still be able to find a buyer for your flat “as is” in its current condition, particularly if you contact a quick buyer.
These companies, such as LDN Properties, are well known for making fast and fair offers to purchase almost any type of home regardless of any structural problems. And not only will you get to avoid paying any commission, but you’ll also benefit from a selling schedule of just a few weeks. The next section of this guide elaborates on this and other ways to sell your flat.
Your options to sell a top floor flat
When you are ready to sell your top floor flat, you’ll need to pick from one of four methods to find a buyer. These choices are selling to a quick home buyer such as LDN Properties, selling at a property auction, selling with an estate agent, or selling without any assistance.
There are some notable drawbacks with a few of these selling options, such as potentially having to wait more than an entire year to find a buyer when you opt for selling on your own or through an estate agent. Other strategies have clear benefits, like being able to avoid paying any commission when you choose to sell your home to an honest no-fee quick buyer.
You should write down your top priorities with selling, including your ideal sale price, your willingness to pay any commission, and how fast you want to sell. Then compare all of these details against the specifics of the four selling methods below because this should assist you with identifying the approach to selling that most closely suits your individual needs.
Selling to a quick home buyer
One way to sell your top floor flat is getting in touch with LDN Properties or another quick buyer. These are companies that make quick and fair offers when you want to sell your freehold or leasehold home, no matter its age, condition, location, shape, size or type – and even if it has any structural damage such as subsidence or other problems you can’t fix before selling.
As well as top floor flats, LDN Properties has made many varied purchases and offers since launching more than 20 years ago, including derelict houses, Laing Easiform properties, vandalised flats, homes with a septic tank, smoker’s houses, properties where the seller has lost important documents like the title deeds, flats that have old or faulty wiring, homes that have an absent freeholder, houses of multiple occupancy, properties located near traffic lights, flats with a low Energy Performance Certificate rating, homes that have noisy neighbours, houses suffering from subsidence and other examples.
These companies are called quick buyers because they can finalise the purchase of most homes in a handful of weeks, and this includes the time needed to exchange contracts and pay the seller the proceeds. This makes them often the most rapid way to sell any type of property.
Another great benefit of selling to an honest quick buyer is that they will not charge you any commission for the transaction, so you can plan on getting the full sale proceeds. That’s preferable for many sellers compared to using an auctioneer or an estate agent, which are two options that will charge fees that be subtracted from the eventual flat sale proceeds.
Selling at a property auction
Alternatively, you may want to sell your top floor flat at an auction, where people will place bids of increasing value on your home, hopefully resulting in a decent final sale price.
But there is no promise that you will receive any bids on your flat at the auction, which would mean it stays unsold and then you’ll need to start over with seeking a buyer, adding possibly many more months to your selling schedule. Or you may get a single bid at the reserve price, which is the lowest value at which you agree to sell, and this is a legally binding agreement to sell that the top bidder/buyer could sue to enforce if you try to walk away from it.
That’s why you must choose a reserve price that will generate a profit from your sale even after the auctioneer has subtracted their commission from the auction proceeds. If you do not, then you could end up selling breakeven near the price that you paid for the flat, or selling at a loss.
Many auctioneers charge commission at 2.5 percent of a home’s sale price, and this is subtracted immediately from the proceeds after the auction is over, adding to your costs. They charge this for their work in selling your home which includes creating a listing that describes the flat and features photographs of it, hosting the auction and overseeing a successful sale.
This is not the swiftest way to sell a flat because it can take at least several months. You will have a long waiting period between the day on which you decide to sell this way and the day on which the auction happens. And if your home sells at the auction, the buyer then has about a month to sign all the required documents and finish their other tasks needed for the sale.
Selling with an estate agent
Yet another way to sell a top floor flat is enlisting the help of an estate agent, who will handle the majority of the work involved with finding a buyer. This includes preparing a listing, advertising it in their office, in local newspapers and online, organising viewings to give people interested in your flat a tour of it, hearing offers and ideally taking one through to exchange of contracts.
If one of your top aims with selling is finding a buyer as fast as feasible, you might want to review other options because it can take more than a year to sell when using an estate agent. Any sellers that want the speediest sale possible should consider other methods instead.
And remember that a buyer can make an offer but then withdraw it, causing the sale to fall apart and delayed a sale further as you will have to start over with trying to find a buyer. This will inevitably add much more time to the overall schedule for selling your flat. And someone can do this without facing any penalties so long as the contracts are not yet exchanged.
You will also have to pay the estate agent commission for their effort in finding a buyer for your flat. This is usually within a range from 1.15 percent to 1.40 percent of the property’s eventual sale price, and it will increase your costs because it is taken out of the final sale proceeds. If you are determined to avoid having to pay any commission when selling your top floor flat then you should review the no-fee options that include selling on your own or selling to a quick buyer.
Selling without any assistance
Or you may be interested in selling on your own, which means you have to handle all of the work with attracting a buyer – everything from making and advertising a listing through to scheduling viewings, fielding offers from buyers and guiding one to the exchange of contracts.
This can be a very slow process and may take more than an entire year, and therefore it is only suggested as an option for people that have managed to sell a top floor flat in the past, or who have a qualified family member or friend who is willing to help them for free with selling. Those are the only ways that you might reasonably be able to sell slightly faster than a full 12 months.
One of the only obvious advantages of selling without any help is that you will not be required to pay commission to an estate agent or an auctioneer, which saves you money, as Equifax says. But this cost saving could be cancelled out by the funds that you may need to spend on advertising your listing and the various other tasks that are involved with trying to sell your top floor flat.
An alternative to this approach for selling is getting in touch with a quick buyer such as LDN Properties, because these companies promise to never charge sellers any commission when purchasing their homes, so you’ll get the same result of not paying any fees. But you will get an additional perk of enjoying a much faster sale because a typical quick home buyer can finish all the steps of purchasing a top floor flat in just a few short weeks, and this includes the important final actions of exchanging contracts and paying the seller their entire proceeds.
Selling a top floor flat: frequently asked questions
Here you’ll find LDN Properties’ answers to common queries we get about selling a top floor flat, just one of the many categories of homes that we have bought since launching in 2003.
Your top questions when selling a Top Floor Flat
As the name suggests, this is a leasehold flat that is located on the top floor of a building. This type of property is sometimes also referred to as a penthouse, although that term might be reserved for higher end homes. If you have a top floor flat then this likely means that there are several other flats in the same building and you likely have a neighbour on the floor below.
There are a number of explanations for why someone could want to own a top floor flat compared to one on a lower floor of a building. One such reason is that the flat will have better views than other units in the building, another justification can be that the buyer does not want to have anyone living above them because they are worried about possible noise issues.
Whilst buyers might view a top floor flat favourably for several reasons, they could also be wary about making an offer on this type of home. Some downsides of this property can include if it is several floors high but there’s no lift and it can only be accessed by stairs, if the flat has previously had a leak in the roof or currently has one, and a number of other concerns.
Perhaps the most important step that you can take is cleaning your property thoroughly before you attempt to sell it, which means removing all of the clutter from rooms to make them as spacious and tidy as possible. Although there is not much work you can do outside the property, you can still potentially give window frames a fresh coat of paint and fix any broken glass.
There are four standard options available for selling a top floor flat or any other type of home, and these are contacting a quick buyer such as LDN Properties, selling at an auction, selling with an estate agent or selling without any assistance. There are prominent advantages and disadvantages with each of these choices in terms of time taken, cost and other factors.
Selling to a no-commission quick home buyer like LDN Properties will ensure that you do not have to pay any fees, so you can count on receiving the full proceeds. The same is true if you try to sell your flat on your own, but you will pay commission if you sell at an auction or via an estate agent and this fee will add to your costs because it will be taken out of the sale proceeds.
This will change depending on which approach you use for selling your home, with the slowest choice being selling through an estate agent or on your own because either of these methods may take more than a full year. Selling at an auction is next slowest as it will take several months, whereas a quick buyer will only take a few short weeks to purchase your property.
