If you have ever moved house or are in the process of doing so at the moment – you probably have an image in your mind of your dream home will look like, what age the property might be or what the key features will be.  No matter what your budget is or where you are considering moving, everyone creates their list.  Sometimes it’s the practical requirements like off-street parking, sometimes they are more about enjoying the house, like having a south-facing garden.  We have seen some very long lists and we’ve also worked with people who don’t seem to have many requirements, but what they are looking for can be hard to find!

Most people’s property search is now often focussed online, and it is easy to pop a tick in a box and say you only want to look for properties that meet certain criteria, whether that’s number of bedrooms, ensuites or whether a property is detached or not.  This can be helpful when there are lots of properties in a specific location – but our advice would be careful of what you exclude.

Our experience shows that when we talk to clients about properties that aren’t an exact match for all of their criteria, or they view somewhere they had already ruled out online – it becomes their favourite property – these are sometimes the hidden gems of a house search!  This can be because a house has a certain ambience to it, or that the setting of the road or street where the house is located is ideal for them.  It can be that house may not have all the features that they were looking for, but the garden exceeds everything they hoped for!  Buying a home is more than just the practical consideration, for most people it is an emotional decision too!

So we always encourage buyers to think about their wish list, and what elements would make up their dream home, but equally a good Estate Agent will always ask you think outside of those and consider properties that you may not yet realise could be your perfect home!