Selling property guide

Galiciaproperty.com specialises in presenting properties to the standard expected by the international market.

The reason this niche in the market even exists is the low standard of presentation, information and international accessibility (website and google searchable in English) prevalent in the Galician real estate market.

Below is the galiciaproperty guide to how best to prepare your property for sale to the international but quite probably also the higher end domestic market that exists in Madrid and other cities.

Contracting an estate agent

Give one agent/inmobiliaria an exclusive contract to market your property that also motivates them to try to get a good sale price for it.

The norm is to see properties listed (badly) with multiple agents, none of whom have contractual security against buyers contacting the seller directly and avoiding the agent’s commission.
This may seem like a canny approach that keeps all options open and may save a considerable sum in commission, but in fact it means that agents won’t publicise the exact location of the property and also tend to put in a rather underwhelming effort at photographing and marketing it.

Signing an exclusive contract with a carefully selected agent/inmobiliaria gives you leverage to negotiate a lower rate of commission and encourages them to allocate time, effort and also money for publicising the property in the knowledge that a sale to any purchaser will give them a contractually guaranteed commission. It can also add motivation and provide longer term flexibility if the exclusivity contract is time limited.

Take a look our our sales process section for more detail on how to frame a contract with an estate agent.

Describing the property

Provide a full and balanced description of the property to avoid surprises when prospective buyers come to view it.

As you can see in the examples listed in the galiciaproperty search service page, some agents omit fundamentally important information from their property listings in an effort to get people to the property where the agent can then try to fast talk them into ignoring the huge glaring problem.

Whilst there is no need to be too negative nor to highlight problems, a property should always be described and photographed fully. Failing to do this is a fast way for an agent to destroy their reputation in the international market as foreign clients may have taken precious time off work and paid for expensive flights and hotels to come and see a property.

If your property has problems then these should be reflected in the price and the liklihood is that the lower price will attract buyers for whom these problems are not insurmountable and who won’t be immediately put off the property when they arrive to view it and are confronted with said problems.

Presenting the property

Without misrepresenting, present your property at its best.

The international market for Galician property is to a large extent people seeking a rural idyll and/or a holiday property or, to put it another way a dream (not in the unrealistic/badly researched sense, necessarily).

The photos you use to market your property should help this dream to blossom, not kill it! Specifically:

  • Only use pictures taken in sunny weather and at the best time of day to make the property look attractive
  • Tidy up before taking photos – lived in is fine, mess isn’t. Wash the dishes, tidy stuff away, cut the grass, etc. and also don’t try to make displays of your stuff; less is more attractive.
  • Move all cars so you can photograph the property from all angles without the cars being in shot.
  • No people in the photos, nor the family dog. Buyers want to imagine themselves in the property, not you.
  • Modern cameras allow you to take panoramic photos and to use multiple shots to correct exposure variations within the shot (so you can see both the inside of a room and the view through the window). Use these great technologies.

And to avoid misrepresenting, always use up to date photos.

Check the advertising of your property

Before your agent advertises the property anywhere check everything that they are going to say about the property and all pictures they will use to advertise it.

You know your property better than the agent does and so it’s always a good idea to check that everything they use in advertising it is correct and also that you are happy that they have presented the property as well as is possible.

Location, location, location

This is the internet age – you should always provide an exact GPS location.

As above, Galician agents/inmobiliarias tend to avoid providing GPS locations for properties in an attempt to stop buyers going directly to sellers and avoiding the agent’s commission.

Unfortunately by doing this they lose 90% of potential international buyers who assume that the lack of GPS is to hide some problem or simply won’t take the risk to come to Galicia to see a property they haven’t been able to view on google maps first.

Google maps/streetview is now a fundamental tool in international buyers deciding whether they are interested in a property or not, and so you have to provide the information necessary to use it.

Viewings

Always let agents handle viewings, especially first ones.

As above, potential buyers like to imagine themselves in a property, not be given a view of someone else’s life there. In fact having the sellers present for a significant portion of a viewing can be quite offputting.

Agents are very motivated to sell your property and should be professional at doing just that; not talking too much, not talking about themselves, covering all the necessary points, etc.. So let them get on with that, and if you are in the property at the time of a viewing then it’s better to meet the potential buyer when they arrive and after they’ve gone round the property but to not accompany them going round at least the house portion of the property.

In summary

The approach outlined above does not, of course, guarantee a sale. It does, however, treat potential purchasers with respect for both their time and their intelligence, and tends to mean that the people who come to view the property are genuinely interested in it and less time gets wasted all round.

As many of the competing properties will be badly listed by Galician inmobiliarias, perhaps failing to mention important problems and as a result proving a let-down when the real property is viewed, taking this approach will ultimately make your property stand out positively by comparison and therefore in the final analysis it will be more likely to sell.

If the above makes sense to you then consider using galiciaproperty to market your property then consider using our sales assist service.