Selling a house privately: which website?

[Nicola]

Just wondering which websites people use or have come across when they've been looking for houses for sale? (I don't mean specific agents, just the sites that advertise properties).

Thank you

[Sebastiano]

Originally Posted by Nicola

Just wondering which websites people use or have come across when they've been looking for houses for sale? (I don't mean specific agents, just the sites that advertise properties).

Thank you

take a look at: Tiscali Annunci - Subito.it Vendi & Compra di tutto in Italia
it will open at the page where you can click on any region of the country,then on category (immobili) then on the kind of thing you're looking for (appartamento -villa-rustico etc) and endless pages come out for private sales.Most or all italian internet servers like libero,virgilio,alice etc all have similar pages.

[adriatica]

i also find this site is good.. everywhere in italy

private and agents... also it links into sole 24 which has some good advice... however its mainly in italian


Case ed appartamenti in vendita o affitto, annunci ed agenzie immobiliari - Eurekasa.it

[alan h]

I noticed recently that the agent I used a few years ago now puts a few properties on e-bay. You might like to try that.

One near to mine is on it

Casa indipendente di 220 metri quadri a Armeno su eBay.it Piemonte, Case in Vendita, Case e Appartamenti

You can see the view in one of the pictures - fantastic, [and not a Brit in sight]

[HouseAbruzzo]

I've used Ebay for my own house in Campania (I mean mine, not a client's one).
Three months of advertising brought me a lot of messages, great visibility, a bill of 130 euros and no sale.

[umbria lover]

WE've tried a variety of sites...some bring mostly spam, while others, like Craig's List, have produced NO results...unless you count the fact that someone used my blog to send out spam which caused my host site to crash!

We did take out an ad in Italy magazine, and our house is also now listed on the Italy magazine website. Additionally we've found some agents who are willing to list our house without an exclusive agreement.

In discussing this idea on other message boards, everyone seems to have good ideas, but in reality they just don't have a high enough ranking to come up on Google searches. We have a "House for Sale" post on our blog that usually comes up in the first or second page of a search using the words "house for sale Umbria", but other than that, I don't really have any private sites to recommend.

Because selling a house in Italy takes a lot more time than selling a house in the U.S., we expected it to take a least a year to sell our house. Maybe if you're in a really popular (touristy) spot you could sell more quickly, but where we are, immersed in the Umbrian countryside, surrounded only by Italians, we realize it may take a while.

Of course I don't know where your house is located, or what your expectations are, but in general, patience is the key...along with a little help from your friends! I made a trifold brochure that I've sent to B&B's owned by friends, and I've also emailed this document to other friends who've printed it our for distribution in their area. Creativity is the key, so think of what you can do to advertise your house thru word-of-mouth...is there a place in your (Italian) town where you could hang a poster? Is there a local agent who'd be willing to list your place withou demanding an exclusive agreeemnt? Have you thought of running an ad in magazine or newspapers, or on websites such as this?

Best of luck to you, and perhaps others will have some better suggestions.

[HouseAbruzzo]

Your blog is just wonderful and very pleasant to read, Umbria Lover.
The best Internet solution is to construct a page "only" for the purpose of selling the house and work on the meta tags and the content to reach Google's envied page positioning. Use a dedicated web page builder like Dreamweaver or Front Page, not a blog.
If you mix general info with a commercial issue, the results will not be as good.
In detail, after reading your blog, I noticed that the meta tag title can be improved by eliminating Art and Barb Live in Italy! and replacing it with, as an example, House For Sale In Umbria Property Italy: in fact Google will look at the title when deciding how high to rank your blog webpage. That way, if someone enters in Google search the query "house italy sale", your page will also appear, although the keyword Umbria was not entered as part of the query. Many people might like your house in Italy and discover is in Umbria afterwards.
Plus, make sure that the keywords HOUSE - SALE - UMBRIA - PROPERTY - ITALY are repeated in the context of the page using different phrases with a sense.
The description meta tag is missing: that is used by Google software for ranking the positioning of your page.
There is a lot more, but what is essential is the above.

[ronald]

I think the logic should be "how much do I need to sell the house? How much will it cost me to advertise around a bit (typically not much more that a few hundred euro if you really splash out)? What will I gain by a direct sale? If the gain is more than the investment then invest a bit in advertising. It would be great if there was just one website that would do the trick but usually you need to spread your bets a bit!

As Umbria lover says Italy Magazine does offer the possibility to individual owners to list their house (and without wanting to blow our trumpet too much we are currently the top Google results for property for sale in italy - Google Search)

All I would add is wherever you add your listing spend some time to think about it. It is an ad - you have to make people want to ask you about the property. Think about the text and the images and make sure you cleaned the house and made the beds and that it is a sunny day before you take pictures!

A look around our http://www.italymag.co.uk/property-for-sale-in-italy/ will show you that that is not always the case!

I think the idea of a blog is excellent - it can provide a very immediate way to get in touch with potential buyers.

Finally getting involved in online communities such as the Italy Magazine forums, as long as it is not done with purely the view of advertising can generate some more interest.

[ronald]

Well - not sure it was a fundamental flaw but you are right it was a flaw. We have now added the navigation at the bottom as well - thanks for the pointer!

[umbria lover]

And even tho I do advertise in Italy mag, I have to say that I don't find the property ofr sale section very easy to use. Maybe it's just me, but quite often when I enter my search info, I then get a reply that no matches were found, when in fact I do know there ARE matches.....has any one else experienced this?

And thak you for your kind words about my blog and for the advice to maximize my exposure. I really don't want to change the name of the blog tho...just adding in the (House for Sale) part was a bit of a stretch for me...after all, it started as a blog, and really remains a blog...a web journal of our life in Italy.