1. Ring and arrange a minimum of 3 estate agents to value your property, which will take you about 4 hours.



2. Once you have decided on an agency you then need to arrange for that estate agent to revisit your property to take the details, photo's and sign an estate agency agreement committing to pay them a commission (generally 1.5 - 2.5%).

3. You will then have to conduct a series of viewings, depending on market conditions tens or hundreds.

4. Wait for a prospective buyer to make an offer if you can find one.

5. Consider any offers taking into consideration whether the prospective buyer has a chain or not. Note chain can break at any point.

6. Wait for the buyer to have a survey carried out which generally can take up to 3 weeks.

7. The buyer will receive the results of the survey, generally a week after the survey has taken place. At this point the buyer will either want to proceed with the sale or withdraw depending on the results. If the buyer withdraws you have to continue back to step 3 in the process.

8. Wait for all the legal work and contracts to be finalised, which can takes up to 12 weeks, the UK national average, for the legal process. There may also be problems that come up in the legal work for example bad searches etc. You run the risk of the purchaser withdrawing from the sale, which gets you back to step 3 in the selling process. If everything is ok you will exchange contracts and set a completion day.

9. You will have to pay your solicitor, which is generally around ?700-?1200 + VAT including all disbursements, your estate agents their commission 1.5 - 2.5% + VAT and any surveys and energy reports.

Selling your property conventionally could take around 5-6 months. That is if you find a buyer straight away and there are no problems during the process. But if there are problems or you struggle to find a buyer it could take much longer.