Last updated 09:43, Friday, 04 July 2008

HOW do you make sure the Prince picks Cinderella?

For sale: Numerous signs indicate competition in the housing market is on the increase.

Or to put it another way, with around a million properties and only 150,000 buyers in the UK housing market, how do you ensure your home is one debutante who finds a suitor?

It’s hard to spot a silver lining in the cloud of bad news over the current housing market.

Rightmove, the property website, says: “There are currently 15 houses for sale for every potential buyer, compared to seven last year. And houses are taking about 85 days to find a buyer!”

The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors gloomily forecasts that house sales could fall by almost 40 per cent making 2008 the worst year the housing market has suffered since 1991.

Other experts have jumped on the Cassandra bandwagon, predicting that house prices will lose almost a quarter of their value in the next 18 months.

Howard Archer of Global Insight said: “We forecast house prices falling 24 per cent from their August 2007 peak of £199,600, to stand at £152,683 at the end of 2009.”

And chief UK economist at Citigroup Michael Saunders said: “Prices are already almost five per cent lower than last year. This is by far the lowest since data began in 1997 and yet another sign that the UK housing market is in freefall.

“Our base case – base case, not worst case – is for house prices to fall 20 per cent over this year and 2009 combined,” he added, glumly.

So much for the woes afflicting sellers. But buyers are not basking in financial sunshine either. Getting the cash to buy a home has rarely been so hard.

The number of mortgages approved by Britain's biggest banks fell last month to the lowest level since records began 11 years ago. Approvals dropped to just under 28,000 in May – a 20 per cent fall in just a month, and a 56.1 per cent fall since May last year, according to figures from the British Bankers' Association.

So how do we pick the bones out of this rotten mess?

Today’s home sellers are faced with two main challenges: fewer buyers because they can’t get mortgages, and more competition – Rightmove's May House Price Index shows that there are 25 per cent more properties on the market compared to six months ago.

So how do you attract a buyer to your one-in-a-million home? By thinking like a professional, taking a scientific approach to selling through the “laws of attraction”.

Rightmove emphasises the three Ps – pricing, presentation and promotion.

1 Pricing: With loads of similar properties for sale, intelligent, researched pricing will set your home apart from the crowd. Do you know how similar houses for sale in your area are priced?

2 Presentation: First impressions count. Package your home so that it's a product people want to buy – a place buyers can see themselves living in. Is your garden tidy, the front door painted, the rooms de-cluttered and the decor neat and neutral?

Nationwide Building Society found that 55 per cent of potential buyers would find an untidy house a major turn-off, and 75 per cent of people would be put off by household smells.

3 Promotion: So you’ve priced to attract, and made your home just what the House Doctor ordered. But how do you get your property to stand out?

The ‘House of the Week’ advertisement in the local paper is the traditional way and it still works. But don’t forget home hunters now trawl the internet 24/7.

A third of recent buyers said the Net gave them the first sight of the property they fell in love with. So try and get your home ‘showcased’ at the top of the web page or highlighted within results to improve your ‘clickthroughs’.

And don't just sit there. Be proactive! If you carry out your own research about local schools, shops and transport links, you can have all that information neatly printed ready to present to a buyer, thus boosting your home’s appeal.

Keep in touch with your agent and get feedback after each viewing. Call them if they don’t call you. If a buyer has crossed your house off the list you need to know why. Maybe you can fix it?

Mystery shopping – or pretending to be a buyer to judge how the agency promotes your property – is another canny move, though it could be embarrassing if the agent recognises you.

On the subject of agent liaison – this is possibly not the best time for inexperienced sellers to follow the fashion and bung their own advert onto a website, with the aim of cutting out the cost of employing a high street estate agent.

“A sluggish housing market means sellers need all the professional advice they can get, says property expert Michelle Pughe-Parry.

So choosing the right estate agent is even more crucial at this time of trial. It’s probably best to stick to busy agents who are members of the National Association of Estate Agents (NAEA).

Most agents will charge a percentage of the sale price but avoid those who try to add a lengthy lock-in clause which would prevent you from swapping to another agent if the first one fails to find a buyer. Negotiate to get the best deal. Remember, the estate agents need your business.

Phew...Do you remember the days when house sales were clinched simply by the smell of baking bread and fresh flowers on the kitchen table....?