House Hunting is the most exciting part of the Home Buying Journey for many people. Browsing the portals, getting out to see the properties, finding out where you want to live and what you can afford. But it can be tough work! This episode, I am guiding you through the basics of house hunting. Where to look for your home, how to decide what you are looking for, what you need and what you want. Then in our interview I am talking to Melanie Murphy (https://www.youtube.com/c/MelaNiie), author and vlogger, who tested out our Irish Home Buyer’s Journal and now is the proud owner of her first home.
She talks through her trials and tribulations in buying a home, a self-employed and creative person, plus how she found the whole home buying process. Finally we go through our In Out & Away properties with a special guest, agent Mark Conroy from Tullamore.
In New Home vs Old Home we find the only New Homes development in Wexford. And for News we hear that a major lender has hiked rates; shared equity scheme is extended to Self-Builds; Bungalows are Back; and MyHome.ie have their latest report with good news for house buyers.
Visit us at https://irishhome.ie/and on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/irishhomema… to comment and vote on our stories.
Buy the Irish Home Buyer’s Journal here: https://shop.irishhome.ie/
Transcript
Hello and welcome back to the Irish Home Show. This is episode six of our Home Buyers Journey series. We are taking you through every step in the journey to buy your first or your future home. Each week, we're going through every stage in the house buying journey from savings and mortgages through the house hunting and beyond. Last week we started on house hunting and we discussed how to find a home on the various property portals and with estate agents in Ireland. We had a great interview with Melanie Murphy about her journey to buy her family. This week we are going deeper into house hunting and we will be talking about how to apply to agents when you're interested in the property, how to ask the right questions, and what to do during your house viewings. That will all be my explainer section, after which I'm gonna be talking to Joanne Gerie, the managing director of my home, e one of Island's leading property portals. She gives us a great update on what's happening in the market right now and what to look out for, and she also goes into great depth about what My Home Dot, IE can do for you, how you can find properties better with them, and some interesting features and useful resources on their site that you should look out. Finally on, in, out and away, I'm going to KA and showing you what you could afford on one of the most northern, most counties in the Republic. And in new home, Old home, I'm also gonna be comparing available new properties in those northern counties. Finally, I'll wrap up with News of the Week. There's been a lot of news at the moment, so stay tuned for that. To see clips of our interviews and all our features, go to our Instagram at Irish Home Magazine and make sure you follow us there and subscribe here to the Irish Home Show. Thanks for joining us again, and let's get on with the show. 📍 So welcome to part two of our house hunting explainer section. This week I'm gonna be talking you through what to do when you've spotted a house that you want to see on one of the property portals or on an agent's website. I'm gonna be outlining how to apply to the agent, how to phone or email them, and then what you should be preparing to do when you first go to a. First up contacting the agent. I know this might seem very straightforward, but I have a lot of questions on this. Everyone's very nervous about getting it right, and so it's worth going through at this stage, and we can talk through the best way to apply to an agent to see a property. First things first. The portals actually make it really easy to after my home, both allow you to very quickly put in your contact details and contact the agent on behalf of a property If you listen to last week's episode, you should know, you should have already signed up your email address so that you get instant updates of every new property coming in, in your target area or your target price range. So you should have got an email straightaway, the new property that you like, and you can click straight away and be straight on to the agent. I find there's an agent, some of the most likely people to buy the house are the ones who are first on the phone to us or emailing us because they have the alert set up, they know their target area, and they're the keenest outta the. So first things first, yes, I would email the agent. It's very easy to do. Just follow the links in my home or dft and you can send a quick email straight from the website, which will go into the inbox. Now these will normally give you a very generic message, but it is worth writing in the message box and putting a little bit of extra flavor in there. maybe an affirmation that you would really like to see the house at the next available opportunity. And great if you have some extra bonus fee days such as your cash buyer or your mortgage buyer ready to go, anything like that will make you stand out for the crowd. The second thing I'm gonna suggest is that you also phone the agent when it comes down to a bidding war. A lot of agents will see names on a page and emails in an inbox, but actually getting to know the buyers is really important in my opinion. When it comes down to a toss up between two buyers, the ones that you've known and seen and spoken to several times you're gonna feel a lot more confident that they are the right buyer for the house. Sometimes it's not always about who has the highest offer. I'll come onto this next week when I talk about bidding, but sometimes it is the total package. I am looking for the buyer who is gonna be the most likely to proceed with the sale first time. And so that's gonna bring in a lot of Fantas, such as how much do they want the house, what are. For being in that area or on that particular road. And if you can start getting a bit more person with your agent, getting to know them and you will find that they'll be much more receptive to you, They're more likely to come back to you quicker. They're more likely to keep you abreast of the pricing on the property and offers on the property. So email first, but then follow it up with a phone call and get chatting to the agent. It's a good opportunity to ask some questions. We'll come onto that in a second, but also, it's a really good opportunity for the agent to get to know you, for them to remember you and know, okay, those guys are ready to go. They're a good buyer. They are mentally in my head at the top of my list. So hopefully now you've got in contact with the agent and they have a schedule for viewings. You have an appointment or a time of an open house. This stage is a good opportunity to ask some important questions upfront. If you can either do it on the phone or if the agent prefers an email, now you can go too far and ask a million questions and a lot of them to be fair. Physical properties of the house are best left until you're in the house or have seen the house once, and they can ask a more detailed set of questions. However, I'm getting a lot of really good, prepared buyers asking very important questions at the moment. And those are mainly questions regarding the current owners of the house and what are their intentions, what are their expectations, and what are their own plans? And to be honest, as a sales agent, it's also something I'm asking all my clients, first of all as well, because. I think buyers and agents out there are finding we can sell people's houses really right now, but a lot of vendors will then really struggle to find something to buy, whether there isn't enough available stock, or they're also competing in that same bidding war as well, and they can have their own place set, agreed, and spend weeks or months trying to find somewhere to move to. It is really frustrating for the buyer if you are hanging on, hoping for your seller to find something to move. So some really good questions are why are the vendors selling? And you might find that they are moving to a different area or downsizing or upsizing. Do they know where they're going? Have they gone set, agreed on a house already? Have they bought another house already? Have they got their eye on something or are they completely fresh and no plans, or are they moving into a already prepared property or a rental or moving abroad? Anything like that might be a lot easier. And you'll know that there's no onward chain and could make the process much simpler. So really good question to find out where they're going or if they have a. You can ask what expectations the agents and the vendors have about the price the house is gonna go for. But I think at this early stage, you're probably not gonna get much out of them. For now, the asking price should speak for itself, perhaps a little bit further down the line. Or if the property's been on the market for a little while, perhaps, then you can ask look, it's been on the market for a while. What are they really hoping to get? Is that the asking price? Is it below? Is it above? And that you might just be able to glean a little bit of information. If an agent is struggling with a sale he's gonna be more likely to give away that info. He wants to get the ball rolling, so ask the question. There's no harm in it. So next you are ready to walk in for that first viewing. I suggest you always do a bit of a wrecky before you go to a viewing of a house, drive around the area, even walk it if you can, get to know some of the local amenities or parks or shops and just get a good idea. Do a drive by late in one evening and see if the road is quiet or busy or not. Many lights on in the street too many cars parked on the side of the road. These will give you a sense of the property through the entire span of a week instead of just on that one sort of hour and a Saturday afternoon when you're viewing. But now it's time for that viewing What should you be looking for in a property? I like to recommend to people the three Ls of real estate. It used to be location, but I found a great new way that you really should look at a house before you even go in it, or when you first step in the door. These are three things that you can't change about a property. They are essential fundamental factors that no matter of spending or upgrades can improve. They are number one, location. You can't move the location of your house. It is where it is as one of the things you can't change. That's why they always say find the worst house on the best road, because if that's a great area, you are in the right place, you can always upgrade the house. So number one, it's always location. Try and find the best location. Then that could be the best location for you. It doesn't have to be location for everyone else. So what suits you? Is it near work or schools or a. Outdoor space that you like or immunity that you like to attend? The second L of real estate layout, the size of the site, area of the house can't be changed In most properties. You have what you have, and then the house itself. Again, the original layout of the house is fundamental to most properties, unless you're gonna completely demolish it and rebuild. You can work with that you can extend or knock through, but it's very hard to change the fundamentals there. A good layout is important and it's worth paying attention to how the house is currently arranged on the floor plan and in the photos. Finally, the third L of real estate is light, 📍 and again, related to layouts. What angle is the house positioned on the road or in the street? Which way is the back garden facing? What rooms gets the sun from the east of the south or the west at different times of day? You can't change that. So what light does the property get and where is it during the day? Those are the three Ls of real estate, location, layout, and light. Now your first walkthrough of the House should really be about the vibes that you get from that home. How do you feel standing in each of the rooms? What is the back garden like? Can you see yourself in that kitchen? Don't worry about the small stuff initially. Think about the bigger picture. You're looking at the layout, the four walls, the light, and thinking about that. Now you've done that. Here are 10 things you should check or ask when viewing a house. Number one, when was the property built? Most good agents will be able to tell you if it's in an estate, they'll know roughly the era that the area was built up in. It's worth knowing because houses from the thirties or the fifties will have different issues than houses from the sixties or seventies, eighties or nineties. Marker number two? Is it freehold or leasehold? Most properties in Ireland are freehold. Now this is where you own everything down to the ground, but there are some leasehold properties still left out there, especially in Dublin. And if you're in apartment building of a certain age, you might have a leasehold. More modern ones would have a share of the freehold. that brings me to question number three. Is it a service charge or an estate charge? If you're in an apartment, you are going to have a significant service charge that could be anywhere between 1500 and 3000 a year. The average is around 2000 a year at the moment. This pays to cover the maintenance of the whole building, the running and servicing of the lifts, the insurance for the block, and just general grounds keeping cleaners, et cetera. However, sometimes if you, not even in an apartment block, but on an estate sometimes there will be a smaller estate's charge for the year. Sometimes it's only 50 or a hundred euro. This is to cut the lawns, trim the bushes, and generally keep things tiny. Sometimes it can be voluntary, sometimes it is run by a professional management. Number four. What's the building energy rating? The building energy rating, or b e r is the color coded. A to G rating of how energy efficient the house is. Every sale in the country should have one of these preprepared already. Now sometimes they're useful. Different houses can have a widely varying vrs depending on what hidden features like insulation have been included in the house. A clever trick is to take the ER number, which should be listed on the property listing online, and put it into the SE AI's website. Then you can download the full B report, but also the advisory report, which is a great extra document, which has been updated recently and is all color coded and will give you a good idea of what is bad in the house and what it could be upgraded to. So it might say, Look, the walls, bring it down to an F, but if you put insulation in, you could bring that up to a c. So worth checking out the S E I website. Number five. Let's check the services. How is the house heated and how is the hot water heated? Is it gas fired by the mains or oil tank in the garden, or electric heaters on the walls? Is there a hot water tank with an immersion or Serta panels or run off the boiler? It's always important to find the boiler and the hot water cylinder in the house to get some gauge of how old they are. Usually on the boiler, there's a date of when it was installed, or at least dates of recent services. Make sure those are recent and the hot water tank check that it is insulated, or see if it's one of those older copper colored ancient ones. All these are important to know if you're gonna need to upgrade them in the near future. Number six. Let's get out in the garden and have a look at the outside. What aspect is the back garden? It's a crucial question for many, but don't overlook houses that don't have a perfectly south facing garden. It really depends on the angle of the house. It could depend on what trees or neighboring buildings are nearby blocking the sun. The best thing to do is get outside and use the Compass app on your phone, or there's a great app called Sun's Path, which will show you where the sun comes from morning till night at different times of the. Everyone will tell you that natural light is really important for our home, but let's just see where it comes into the house. Is it into the front rooms, the back rooms, the kitchen or the living room? then you can think about how you are gonna use the house and where you want the sun at different times of day. Number seven, Has the house had any previous extensions? Usually these are pretty obvious, but it's worth asking the agent and then finding out when they were done. There is a checkered history of extensions being built without planning permission. Now you are allowed 40 square meters of a ground floor extension without planning, but many properties were extended back in the eighties or nineties and probably didn't have any proper planning at the time. They are usually eligible for an exemption, but this might need an architect to come out and check and sign off. It's worth asking the question. Has that been done or is there original planning? It's usually solvable, but might always take an extra few weeks or months for the solicitors to work out. Let's look at the attic now. Has it been converted or is it convertible? The best way to work out if an attic has potential for a conversion is to look from the outside at the height of it. If it's a really tall peak, it probably has a good headroom height inside. But look to the neighbor's houses. Do you see any skylights or any dormers that come and stick outta the roof with windows on? That's a good sign that if neighbors have done it, it's probably possible on your house and probably eligible for planning permission if it's not, then ask if it's been insulated and who it's been floored. It may just be good storage area. Number eight. Let's look around at the condition of the property. Look at any plaster work inside the house for any signs of damp or any skirting boards that would've decay. On the outside look for any cracks or damage that might be a concern. I'll be going into more detail in this in a couple weeks when I'll be talking to a surveyor about exactly what they look for when they're looking around a property. Number nine inventory. It's worth looking around the house and asking what is gonna be included in the sale. If there is a fitted kitchen, just make sure that all the integrated appliances are going to stay. A fridge and a freezer that are built into a kitchen unit should be included as standard. But if there's a free standing washing machine in a utility room, just ask the agent up front if that's gonna be. It used to be more common that people would take them with them now as they're getting a lot cheaper to buy new ones. Most people just would rather leave them plumed in situ, and if they need to buy a brand new one when they move to a new property. Equally, if there's furniture in the house that you might like or they are saying is available, then it might be worth keeping it even if it's just for the first few weeks when you move in. It's always important to have a sofa to collapse on the first night when you've moved a million boxes into the house. Even if you're not keeping it for a while, the waiting list for new furniture deliveries can be long and it's worth having something to sit on, even if it's only for the first few. Finally on your way out, number 10, let's look at the parking situation. If it's a house is or off street parking and for how many cars? And if not, what's a street parking situation like? Do you need a permit? If it's an apartment, find out if there are designated spaces or if it's a free for all in the car parking area and see if the car park is full at different times of day. In some apartment schemes they are flush with people with two cars each and filling up the whole space. So it's good to know that you have a regulated and designated space that is always gonna be left vacant for you. That's it for my viewing checklist. Now I wanna explain what to do after you've been to a house viewing. If you're really interested in the house always follow up with an email to the agent saying that you are interested and you want to be kept in the loop. You want to know if there's any offers coming on the property and if there's any future 📍 viewings, If you can see the property a second time, it's always worth it. There are always things you miss in the first viewing, and it also looks good to the agent and the vendor that you've been around the house twice and you know it very well. I'd say a couple of days after you've emailed the agent, I'd follow up with the phone call as well. Try and just keep in their ear a little bit so they remember you and they don't forget you. When the bidding. That's enough for this week. I'm gonna go into more detail next week about the bidding process and how to make offers on a home. coming up next, my interview with Joanne Gary, the managing director of my home dot e. Stick around. 📍 📍 📍 📍 📍 📍 📍 📍 📍 so this week I have the managing director of my home, Doee, Joanne, Gary. Joanne. How are. I'm great. Thanks, Ben. Yeah, good to be here. Fantastic. Thanks so much. A as you know, we've been going through in this series, the house buying process, and I've talked to people about savings and mortgages, and now we're getting onto the house hunting factor, and obviously you guys are a key part of that in any Irish. , house hunter's life. you've just released your Q3 report, which is showing good signs. What's the sort of takeaways from So We just this week actually, so we're the first week of October at the moment and we've released our quarter three data in relation to the residential market and what that data tells us. That asking price inflation has started to slow down and ease that runaway asking price inflation, which we would've seen, at the back end of last year so asking price inflation. On the, My Home report stands at 7.8% nationally in q3. Back in quarter one, that asking price inflation would've been 12.3%, and in Q2 it was 10.9%. So now you can see what's happening was that we had very strong start to the year in terms of asking price inflation was you? Growing quite dramatically at that 12%. That was really in the main led by regional Ireland. That's still that covid effect of people. Paying high rents, moving outta Dublin cork and so on. Moving back to the Westport and the skulls and Dun Garvans of the world. So it was regional prices that were fueling and driving, asking price inflation, but in Dublin as well. Which you can see that started to cool off. And that's a good thing, right? Because as people that work in the property market, and even for people that are considering buying in this market, as we talk about buyers we want stability in terms of pricing. And what we can certainly see by the end of this year is that asking price inflation will most likely settle at about 6% in the Irish market for this. And as we look forward to next year we forecast that asking price inflation will be at about 3%. So you can see that what we're doing is we're coming off very fraught, the pricing that would've been in the first quarter of the year, and that started to cool and ease. Now as we're here in October. Yes, certainly from the view from the ground has been very much like that, the last two years it's been really typified by a lack of supply and very phonetic bidding people getting very much over the, asking prices on a lot of things, even in Prime South Dublin, where I am. And that probably hits. A peak in early part of this year, March to May, where we were getting incredible prices and, no one really thought it would last that has come down. Asking prices have, need to have come off to get things sold. Now, it was already doing that at the start of the summer. I think we hit a very slow summer in terms of viewings, because I think pure two holidays that have been saving up for the last two or three years. And then since then with interest rate rises and things, it certainly has the fism from buyers has cooled off. But also, more importantly it seems that there's been a great rise in the number of sales coming to market available. Properties on the market has increased Yeah. And that's really good news. There, I just checked my home before I came on to, to speak to you on the podcast. So what are we're the 3rd of October, I think today, and there's just over 16,200 properties available for sale on my home at the moment. Good. It's 30% up on this time last year. So if I was talking to you at the beginning of October last year, there was 30% less stock on the market. So more stock means more choice, all, all across in, in each of our counties and locations. It means more choice. It also shows me that vendors. Are probably looking at that asking price inflation that might have been there in Q2 and are now saying, Okay, I'm going to dip my toe in the market and look to put the property available for sale. And it's also helped by increasing new homes product, which we're also very anxious to see coming forward to the market. New homes developers are still playing catch up from when they were construction sites were closed during Covid. And it looks like we will See about 26 and a half thousand new homes units hitting the market this year, which is good. So any improvement in stock is very good for the marketplace. We welcome the extra 30% that we see on my home. It's still not enough to meet the demand in this market. We've really strong, robust demand. Our leads are up over 15%, year and year. Our new homes followers and our social media followers have increased dramatically. We can also see from mortgage information that we get from the Banking and Payments Federation that the typical mortgage is now about 288,000 euro that's up 8% on this time last year. And we also know from talking to our buyer customers that we would survey on my home, that one in five people that have a mortgage today still cannot find something to. So very strong demand, improving supply, but still not enough to meet the demand that we have and that demand in this marketplace from buyers and certainly first time buyers. And you would know this well as an agent, Ben is being driven predominantly by a very dysfunctional rental market. So people playing over-inflated rents. Or being very concerned about the, their tenure of the property that they're renting, concerns around their landlord potentially selling that, that property. And in most cases, not all, but in most cases around the country, if you can get a mortgage and if you can get on the property ladder, it is more likely cheaper for you to buy than it is to rent today. If you can find something to buy. Yes, I'm certainly finding that, in previous downturns or at this stage, In a cycle which might be unpredictable, people would start by asking the question, Should I just stay and rent for another year? Should I continue where I am and not buy right now and wait and hold out? Even if you did think prices were gonna come down 10%, people don't have that time. Two, two ways and keep renting because as you say, it's very expensive, it's very unpredictable. You could be out on your ear, next month. And that uncertainty, the rental market is far more dysfunctional than the sales market, and that's just driving people to continue to demand to buy a home somewhere. Actually all the data would tell me is we don't see price, prices falling in this marketplace in, in the near future. We're not back in 2007. I've been in property over 25 years and in this marketplace we're very in a very different position today than we were. When we had the property crash in, mid 2006, going into 2007, because we have practical full employment now, we have an extra million or so people living in the country. We have a hugely dysfunctional rental market, which mightn't have been the case back in 2007, where rents were still, somewhat manageable and affordable, and there was more rental stock on the market. But most importantly, we have very stringent central bank rules around mortgage lending, which didn't exist back in 2006, 2007. So you can borrow three and a half times, three, three and a half times your income in this marketplace in terms of a of a first time mortgage. You know what that's done is it's kept the reins on pricing. And it's kept the reins on the market. So that's been really helpful. We also have things like the help to buy scheme, the first home scheme, there to enable buyers get on the market. So I don't see a price crash coming. What we forecast is, minor asking price inflation. So increasing prices still for next year, but at about 3%. There or thereabouts. It's not like the market I think is going to run away from buyers next year, that would certainly be my message. And if you're thinking of buying and if you're in a position to buy and you can get mortgage ready before the next round of interest rate increases are coming, I would be encouraging buyers to take that jump. I don't think prices are gonna fall, but equally so I don't think they're gonna run away from them either. So No, I think what you're describing there would be an ideal market for us. Everyone thinks, US agents want prices to keep going up and up. And as you in a rising market, everything is very phonetic and you're very nervous about every sale that gets a higher and a higher price. You think it's gonna fall through right until it actually closes a nice steady two to 4% per year with more. With more property on the market rather than this very tight, narrow market would be better for us. It'd be better for buyers that'd have more choice out there. And pricing is a bit more predictable. That, you know that you're gonna be that from your asking price, not, multiple of it. We would be all very happy if we can just back into a nice, steady steady market. I think you're absolutely right as well. The, although many buyers find it very frustrating that the Central Bank rules over the last 10 years have kept them from getting a bigger loan buying a bigger. It has meant that everyone has, kept within their means and the state and the banks as a whole have not over lent and everyone over borrowed and got over our skis essentially. So hopefully that puts us, as you say, puts us in good stead to ride out, a troublesome couple of years, if that's what it's gonna Yeah I think the unknown factors here, if I look at the market is probably around that consumer sentiment piece. Once we get over the next few months, on those cost living increases, which, we know are big concern for all of us. So cost of living, what's going to happen with interest rates and how people feel generally about the world. Consumer sentiment is a very strong factor and how people feel confidence wise is a very strong factor in the property market. So that's the unknown piece. I would say still that, we need to see how that plays out, but actually the demand is so strong for property. I think if people are feeling a little bit concerned about the market, they're equally concerned about, having a roof over their head, whether they're renting and they want to get on that ladder. So it's a, it's an interesting time, but, I think the market is all the hallmarks and what I can see in the data are that we're in for a market that's slightly cooling, but, still looking at some minor price increases next year. So talking of hard press buyers and how tough it is out there. That's a perfect place for us to segue into some tips that you may have for buyers using your platform. What's the best way? What ways should buyers be approaching my home doe and how should they get the best out of it to find their future? Yeah, I look, I think there's a couple of things that would be of interest to people when they're using my home. First off to, to call out, a couple of stats simulation to the platform. On any given day, we've about 80,000 visitors to my home, to the. The website and to the app that uses on a daily basis. So it's a very heavily trafficked site. And we have 82,000 social media followers. Again, that shows me that there's a big appetite there for property information. But the best way to use my home, if you're a buyer, Really to set up a profile for yourself and to register to get email alerts based on what you're looking for, be a location or or a price category or so on. That's the best way for you to get a property listing. Emails straight to you as it comes onto my home. So creating your profile definitely is, would be my top tip. There's also good features on the website, like the mortgage calculator that's built. Each property brochure that tells you what you would need to be able to raise mortgage wise to afford the property. Key features on properties. The building energy rating, the size of the property. Obviously being able to con connect with the agent, whether that's maybe getting a a market appraisal, if you're interested in putting your home on the market or arranging a viewing. And there's also lots of guides and tips and advice just generally on the site, but, there's a couple of things that I see that and I use myself actually on my home that are really useful. The price change feature. People and I, and a lot of people actually may not be aware that's there. So you can go into a section on my home and search a locality and it'll give you the history of a property if there's been price changing changes on it. So if it's gone up in price, asking price or down in price. So it gives you a sense of. If there's been a price adjustment on the property, that's really useful and the link to the property price register as well. So if you're doing a bit of research and you want to see what maybe a similar property in an area sold for three, four, or five months ago. It links you straight through, through the property price register to enable you to do that research. So there are two sections of the site that are quite heavily trafficked, and I know from users, and I hear it from agents as well that, they're quite useful tools when people are getting going and looking. But definitely setting up the email alert. First thing I would advise someone to do. Yes, that's definitely something that I've been telling everyone in our expander section the first thing they should do, cuz the search results the email alerts are very good and I'll often find if I put up a good house the most keenest buyers are always the one who are onto me within five minutes of it going online. Cause I know they've had the alerts set up. They're straight there. They're the keenest buyer for that particular road or that particular area. Price range, and they're straight onto me for reviewing. So they're invariably buy the house at the end of the day. They're just, they just want it more. So that's a great place to start. And then, yeah, the we also often recommend that the price change thing is great because especially in a market like this, there's some houses that are put on and they might be slightly overpriced. When you see a price change, you can get an idea that perhaps that the seller is motivated and that might be a good reason to look at the property. It also might bring a property down into a range that. Looking at from a range you weren't looking at into your range. And again, a great time to jump on those. So it's worth perusing those on a regular basis and save it as a favorite. And just have a look in your target area for anything that is maybe stuck around for six months and hasn't sold and now has had a price shift. That might be a good sign. You might find a bargain in there. There's opportunities out there. Yeah, I agree with you and I think you're seeing a bit more of that now in this quarter actually, as that asking price inflation starts to cool off a bit and come down, certainly. And as an agent and I worked an agency for over 20 years, the vendor management around maybe over optimistic It's, It is the toughest part of the job. Exactly. Yeah. Vendor expectations. but managing the vendor expectation and the price reduction conversation, are challenging. As an agent, I know from agents that they use our price changing change data quite frequently to help those conversations. And we also have a valuation tool. My value, which agents use to, to enable that. But it's really useful, I think, in this market with a bit of price adjustment going on that buyers, look to that feature as well and use it if they're looking at an area, Yes. And the other thing you mentioned there as well at your link to the Property Pro Register, I actually really like your map function. You can click on the maps and not only see you can click on similar and sold and see other properties within that. You can see other properties within that area that are on the market. And also you can see ones that are sold linked from the price register. So that's great. And there's also a few, a bunch of other things on there. You can check out your commute, You can put in your work address and see how long your commute would be. You can see I, amenities, local schools, parks, those sort of things. They're really good dynamic maps you can pull around and I They are, and it's unique to us actually. In terms of the portal market here. And as somebody who used to work in agency, we know that how somebody searches for a property, they search based on their price criteria, but they're also very specific on the location a lot of the time. And within that location, they're equally specific on, it needs to be within Wharton distance to the local school or the local pub. Or the train station or whatever it is. And you can map all of that on my home in relation to specific properties, which is, it's a really handy feature actually. And that's very much driven from, what we know about users and their search experience and what they look for when they come onto the portal. that's great. Now, sometimes when buyers are going through listings on your site, they may see some that are highlighted as featured or premium. What do they, what does this mean for the buyer looking at it out there and what does it, how does it help vendors and agents with those properties? Yeah, so we have a couple of different products on the platform as you say that people might see with a little band on it or a little sticker on it that says premium or featured. So a premium ad basically is a product on our website that. The estate agent can choose and pay for to bring the property back up to the top of a listing. So for example, if you are looking to buy a property in Butchertown, say, you will see a couple of premium ads at the top. That means that. The agent has paid for that product to shoot the ad up to the top of the listing. Typically what we see on the site is that properties that are at the top of the listing within that premium kind of section would typically get about three times more views than it would if when it's down the listing. And agents tend to use that feature if maybe a property is brand new to the market, they'd. Put it up there for the first week or whatever, or if the property has been sale agreed and it's fallen fallen away and it's back on the market again. They would. Put it back up there to give it a boost or if it's at a price adjustment. Or if a property just needs a little bit of of a boost in terms of viewing. So they would typically get three times more views. And we also have feature adss, which do something similar. They shoot properties up to the top of the listing and they would. Similar kind of four or five times the amount of views because we know from a customer experience or a consumer experience perspective, that people tend to look at the top two or three or four properties in the listing. And no matter what you're looking at, whether it's absolutely. Airbnb done deal or, Exactly. yeah. So the ones at the top of the listing always get the maximum views and then people just get a bit bored or they get distracted and go off and do something else. is it only for high end properties or am I gonna see it if I'm cruising, through, houses of more affordable houses or around the No, it's available to any property, that an agent wants to choose that is at the agent's discretion and they contact us and we shoot it up there. Once that property is upgraded, there is, we list on my home based on chronological order. So if you've put a property up at 4:00 PM today, That's the property that appears first. No, not nothing to do with value. And that's only right, the freshest properties need to be listed first on the site. And then that's where those premium ads and featured adss come in where the agent can just pay a bit more to, to get properties up there for for a period. And they work and we get very good feedback on those as well. Okay. And what else do you find increases the sort of viewability of properties on your site? The videos have been there for a long time, but I think during the pandemic, 3D walkthroughs became a lot more popular. How are you finding agents using those? Yeah, this was something that we brought in during Covid and to enable viewings to continue to happen, albeit virtually. We know that any kind of video animation, walkthroughs again, would tend to get more engagement once they're well shot and there's a quality to them and they don't take too long and all of that kind of stuff. Yeah, it's certainly a feature that people wanna a. Burst of information to give them a sense of what the property is like. Virtual viewings are all well and good. It, they don't necessarily replace the real viewing. I think there is a real benefit in that once somebody is getting quite serious on a property and on their search, it doesn't they don't and shouldn't replace the real viewing. So I'd be quite keen on. Compliments an actual viewing experience as opposed to overtaking it. The o the other element of my home, which is has been a new and emerging one for us in the last year, has been the amount of traction we're getting on social media. You're very active on social media then and you will get this loud and clear but we've 82,000 followers across all of our social media accounts in my home. As we stand here today, that's about 30% up on this time last year because we put a really strong emphasis on building our social media following this year. Over 25% of our traffic to the site comes from one of our social media channels. We've a highly engaged audience on Instagram and Facebook in particular. And, we can certainly see that we can capture somebody's attention on Instagram and they then link through from that property onto the site. They really like it, or it's exactly what they've been looking for, or simply they might like the interiors and they just want a bit of a, of more of a peak at it. So social is working very hard for us. I'd be interested to know how many of them are, how are sort of house hunters and how many of them are just viewing it for looking at nice houses. I think you released the top five properties views this year and I think all five of them were. Beautiful, stunning houses all north of a million or so, I think. And they're obviously ones that, some of the online newspapers have got hold of and shared and people have piled in on. Is that the case or are there sometimes some gems that come out of the woodwork on their own? Yeah, look it, there's always the aspirational kind of aspect of these beautiful homes, and that we see and we all like to, get the sneak peek behind the front door for sure. And definitely, any kind of 10, 12 million plus home that we might be featuring on social, gets a lot those views. But you. It is something that where we've managed to get a highly engaged audience, within those social channels, peop And what I mean by engaged is somebody will comment on it or they'll send it to a friend or, they'll click on the link and they'll, register for for a call with the agent. Or they might book in for viewing. Social media in driving. Engaged users is very valuable to us, and it's certainly something I think you're gonna see an awful lot more of from my home. We're looking and we've been doing some work in TikTok in most recent weeks, so that's been a bit of fun and we're feeling our way through it. Um, Am I. Yeah, so it's it's a bit of a minefield in itself, but again, a lot of engagement, and certainly one I think that's really suitable for lettings and for maybe new homes where you might have a slightly younger demographic. But anything we can think of or come up with that's going to put a property in front of a potential buyer. Is a good thing for us, because it brings more traffic to the site and creates a lead for our agents that lists with us, and that's all a positive development for my home. Brilliant. That's great. Joan, before we finish up, I wanted to ask you more personally about how you look for houses and what you look for in a house when it perhaps you are, you're moving, or even. I'm sure you do it as well. What are your favorite features in a home when you see them? Yeah, I look, I'm, I've worked in property a long time and I've bought and sold property , over, over the years. I suppose for me, I'm always looking for the very the aspirational type of interior and the lifestyle piece and how you might live in a property. I personally like a very contemporary. That's me. And that is something that, that appeals to me and my aesthetic. As I look to my home and the type of alerts I've set up for myself, I'm certainly have been looking a lot at kind of coastal properties and, the West Parks and those type of locations where you could potentially, consider the lifestyle and, Get away from it Having, Yeah, having the bull to and all of those lovely things we all like to aspire to, haven't done it, but I like looking at those You're always looking. So it's usually, to answer your question specifically, it's usually the view or the lifestyle I'm looking at when I look at those properties. Not necessarily what's behind the door such itself, cuz you can always improve that, but you As I say location. You can't change it. You can't take it anywhere else so the rest inside you can change. And is there any one property you can recall in the last year or so that you just saw and it really took your fancy or that you were most interested in? On my home. Yeah, there was one really unusual one that I tracked. It came onto my home back in April, and I 📍 don't know, you might remember this one yourself, but it was called the Old Pub and it was in Dun Worley which is about 15 kilometers outside of cla Guilty. So it wa was an old pub right on, slightly elevated site looking over Dun Worley Beach. Beautiful part of the world for anyone who knows. That part of West Co. And it came onto my home through Henry O'Leary Auctioneers. I need to give them a shout out. It was their property. It came onto my home at 300,000 to buy in a stunning location on, 1.75 acre site. And. It was and planning wise and regulation wise, it could have been repurposed to be a residential property, right? That was the big kind of sales feature of it. It needed complete renovation. Sure. But actually the interest in this particular property was huge, international interest. And it started at 300,000 As the sale progressed, it had a price adjustment to 400,000 So that'll give you an idea of the level of interest. We did a Facebook post on it because I liked it so much. And I was intrigued by the whole notion of buying an old pub and renovating it as a residential property in, in, in Westco. So we reached about 25,000 people on Facebook and we did this, we created an opportunity for the agent and we created about 50 inquiries on that one post. Oh wow. It still hasn't gone up on the property price register, so I don't quite know whether it's sold for the 400,000. I understand it did sell, but the price, the fine price hasn't gone up Waiting to see. Exactly. So that property I was intrigued by. I just thought the location was was stunning, you'd need another 400,000 to bring it up to, to, to spec, I would've thought. But yeah Well, that's, that's some someone's dream home. Lovely. B. Joanne, thank you so much for joining us today. That's been great. I recommend all my all my followers to go and start their search at my home. AE really is the best place to find their property and I appreciate you coming on to talk us through it. My pleasure. Thanks Ben. Thanks to Joe Gui, the MD of my Home dot aee. Now onto our in, out, and away segment where we are gonna be using my home to find some of the most interesting properties around the country. Now, this week I was at a wedding in. The lovely, uh, county of me and then after a stay the night in ca and while we really got a sense of different types of properties up there, it's a whole different world. I think everyone at this wedding was, uh, building their own house. They're all self builders on their own family lands, and that's extraordinary way of life. So I'm inspired by that trip. I'm gonna take a journey up the M three today and see what's available in Dublin or on the edge at least, uh, out in me and away as far as we can go to cabin. And I've picked a price range of 400,000 to 500,000, which is sort of an average price range for Dublin, but hopefully will get you something very interesting as you get further out of town. 📍 So our in property of the week, I've picked something on the, just on the edge of Dublin, so it's kind of part of Dublin, but on the outskirts. This is three summer seat present in Clon. It is caned, but it's just on the outside of the M 50, very near. If you're working for that Facebook data center, this would be a great place to live. Um, this is a three bed, three bath house. It's 102 square meters. Uh, Semidetached home this estate is probably only about five years old. These are really good quality built red brick fronted houses, and the inside is completely empty at the moment. Uh, they need finishing of the floorings, but otherwise kitchens and bathrooms are in. You just need appliances. This is on the market for 430,000 euro. A fairly average dub in price, but not, not reasonably affordable. Uh, this will get you three beds on the outskirts of town. Now for our away property, I'm heading up the M three and I could not miss this truly unique property called Sunnyside in can cross near hells on the market for 450,000 euros from the outside. This looks like three white triangles put together like a spaceship has landed in the ME countryside. Uh, it's truly unique. Set on a one acre site and providing five beds and three baths. This was clearly a 1970s architectural, wonder or monstrosity, depending on what you think of it. The inside looks like the lobby of Trump towers, uh, and the kitchen is something out of the seventies. It has pine ceilings and bright blue walls in the dining room, and as spar staircase up to the first floor. The entire property would need a complete modernization and refurbishment, but it comes on that wonderful garden and even has an enclosed tennis. Definitely a unique property, and one worth checking out. Finally, for a way I've cheated here. I couldn't decide. So I've picked two properties for a away. One is a doer upper and one is walkin ready. The first in list, ray in cabin, this is on the market at 390,000 euros. It is a partly finished four bed, five bathroom house. Extending to almost 5,000 square feet is absolutely huge. Property stone fronted, but the inside is completely empty. It's finished the first fix and would need everything else installed in it. But for 390,000 Euro, you are getting a huge property, which you may spend another a hundred or 150,000 euro completing, which would leave you with a glorious mansion on almost two acres and with a three car garage. Situated just 20 minutes outside of Cabin Town itself. This is obviously someone's self-build project that, uh, grew too large and they couldn't finish sadly, but could be a project for you to take on and complete in your own style, all for the price of less than a three bed semi on the outskirts of 📍 Dublin. Finally, my second away property this week. You must go and have a look at this Hollybrook house in Fair Town, just on the outskirts of Kevin 460,000 Euro. This is a two and a half thousand square foot four bed house, which has been completed and interior designed to an absolutely stunning standard. It's fronted in the lovely traditional local stone, and inside is just decorated to a t. It has a huge kitchen, dining room, separate living room and sunroom, plus a sitting room and a study all on the ground floor. The property is set on just over an acre and is five kilometers from Cabin Town, so there's our choice of in, out and away this week. Will you go with the three bed semi detached house in Connie on the outskirts of Dublin? Will you go as far as can cross for the 1970s architect designed spaceship house, or really pick one of the two giant mansions on the outskirts of Kevin for less than the price of a three bed semi in Dublin. You decide, tell me on social media, which one you would choose. now for new home versus old home. 📍 This week I'm sticking with Kevin and two towns that I drove through while I was up there at the weekend. First up the new home. This is River Cresent in Virginia. It's a lovely town with a great high street, really vibrant sense of life in this little village. Uh, it's just under an hour from Dublin. These are on the market from 350,000 euros, and they are four bed semidetached homes extending to around 2000 square. From the outside, they look like a standard estate that you would find around the outskirts of Dublin. However, actually they're quite cleverly designed inside. They are a three rated. They have four beds on the first floor, and they've already converted the attic into a habitable space. Uh, it's not counted as an extra bedroom, but it could be used for a study or a kid's room or something like that. , so it's done for you. These houses come with natural gas, central heating, pv, sober panels on the roof. Fitted wardrobes included in three other bedrooms, and they're especially soundproof between the properties. These are really good quality builds, but for 350,000, it's a lot for a small town like Virginia. So for our old home this week I'm taking you to another town called Old Castle, just about 20, 30 minutes away. , this is Fenal lower. It's on the market with 345,000. It is a beautiful old stone cottage with a red door. , this is an archetypal Irish countryside cottage. It's four bedrooms and extends to almost 1800 square feet, and it is set on 0.88 of an acre, which is a lovely size garden plot. Inside it needs some decor changes to suit your taste, but it has been insulated through the walls and it has been upgraded to a C one rating, which is fantastic for an old stone cottage like this. So which would you choose the new build in Virginia for 350,000 euros for a four bed or this four bed old stone cottage On almost an acre in Old Castle. tell me on our social media, which one you would choose. 📍 Finally, it's time for the news of the week. First up, there's several headlines about local property tax. Councils have been voting to either raise or lower their taxes some such as single county council have lowered theirs by 7%. While others like Wexford voted to increase it by 15%. Wealthy Dun Lera down, which includes Black rock, dorky Lan in all those areas, voted to decrease theirs by the most, by 15% this year. Now, we talked about local property tax two weeks ago in episode four with Alan from cloud accounts, it's a necessary thing to pay if you are the homeowner. People are up in arms about property tax because it's only a new thing in the last five, six years. However, comparative to other countries like the uk, we pay relatively low tax, and it is a progressive tax, which makes richer, wealthier property owners pay more. Unfortunately, it's something that's probably here to stay, and heaven forbid, it should probably be something that should increase perhaps to take the burden off the poorer in society. I think most new home buyers just know that it's something that is gonna be a part of their home owning journey and aren't too worried about it. You can pay by direct debit or spread it out over the course of a. The average for most people in say, Dublin, would be three, 400 Euro. So it's not a huge amount. It's just an extra hassle. The second news headline is in Great news. Uh, last week we were talking about finance island having hyped their fixed term rates, thanks to a public backlash and some very prominent mortgage brokers such as our friend Martina Hennessy from Do do, they managed to get finance island to walk back on this rake height. At least for those people who are, say greed and expecting to close on their property soon, if you had requested to draw down your mortgage before the 30th of September, you will stick to your lower rate. Unfortunately anyone newly applying for a mortgage from them is gonna be on the higher rate. I suggest you shop around cuz there are still other banks out there who are offering lower fixed rates. Finally, although we were discussing earlier with Joanne from my homes, Ali, that the number of available properties for sale on the market had increased somewhat towards the end of this year. , secondhand properties are still 26% down on their pre pandemic levels, so there's a lot less property on the market right now than there would be in a normal year. There were 📍 15,300 properties on the market in the country in July, 2020. That's almost 8,000, less than the equivalent time of year 📍 in 2019. Now we are starting to see growth in the number of available properties and more homeowners deciding now 📍 is the time to sell. That is good news for everyone, giving everyone more choice and allowing a bit more of a normal market. So fingers cross those 📍 stats start to change. And going into 2023, we're going to have a lot more availability of property. That's it for episode six. Thank you for tuning in, and thank you to my guest, Joanne gear from my home. Do E we've talked this week about inquiring and viewing properties and what to look for in a house. Next week I'm gonna be talking through how to make offers on a property, and my interview is with Robert Homan, who is the managing director of offer.io. They are island's leading online bidding platform technology. You'll see them with many agents around and they allow you to place bids on the property online and track the offers in real time. So please come back next week for episode seven as we continue your journey through the house buying process.
