Lanark wrote:mc2fool wrote:Not so. Righmove have actual sold prices but they just get them from the land registry...
I'm not talking about individual prices or listings but the Rightmove statistics, Rightmove are very handwavy about how exactly they are calculated, which makes their index rather suspect to me.
This is via 'Moving Home With Charlie' on youtube who is a bit of an industry insider. He sells software into the Estate Agency businesses.
Land Registry figures are often 3 to 12 months behind the market and agents can manipulate the figures by 'forgetting' to register the cheaper properties until the very last minute.
Individual prices are what you need to look at 'cos statistics aren't going to help you compare like for like.
The Land Registry listings show the dates so you can make a judgement about their relevance to the current market and BTW, it's the solicitor/conveyancer that registers the sale with the land registry, not estate agents.
Of course, if your property is particularly unique or bespoke or far from any other similar ones then it's more problematic to determine what a realistic price would be, you can only go by the data available and then guess, which is all estate agents do anyway. In the end the only true test is to put it on the market....