The current property market is still very much a “buyers’ market”, with buyers remaining cautious of offering on their next property purchase. For some sellers, many long months of hard work tidying up for each viewing, vacating the property, banishing the dog, delaying family celebrations and so on can have passed before that all important offer is secured. So take this one step further, and imagine how depressing it is to have that offer then subsequently fall through.

Statistics show that in today’s market one in three property sales fails to complete and not for the scary reasons that we all may imagine, such as a bad survey. Instead, the main reasons are a breakdown in communication, and buyers and sellers not understanding the process. Progressing a sale efficiently requires hard work and dedication to ensure exchange of contracts is reached as quickly and smoothly as possible.

To conduct sales progression effectively, you must have regular contact with all of the buyers and sellers, solicitors, other estate agents in the chain and the mortgage adviser if applicable. There must be a high level of understanding of the legal process so that you can explain to both your buyers and sellers the next steps. Statistics have shown that effective sales progression on average reduces the time between offer and completion by 28 days.

At Maddisons Residential, we truly embrace the power of effective sales progression. Once an offer is secured, we gather the details of every link in the chain below and above the sale that we are handling, and summarise this chain to our buyer and seller. If anything then subsequently starts to wobble at any point in the chain, we already have the details of the solicitors and estate agents acting and so can get to the heart of the problem straight away. We update our buyers and sellers every week, and are not afraid to roll our sleeves up and get involved whenever we think we can help. But don’t just take our word for it. See what one of our happy customers said:

“We’ve just completed on our sale and Milly has been absolutely fantastic. She progressed everything in the last couple of stressful weeks in the run up to exchange of contracts brilliantly! She kept the whole chain informed, negotiated between everyone and chivvied people and solicitors along when needed. She really did a fantastic job and we’re so grateful that she was nothing at all like a “typical” estate agent. Thank you very much indeed Milly, we couldn’t have got there without you! “

Ms A Bryant

Milly Stedman – Sales Progression Manager

Milly spent many of her informative years growing up in London before moving to Tunbridge Wells 4 years ago and says it’s the best move she has ever made as she loves everything about the town, its history, shops, cafes, restaurants and things to do. Prior to joining the team at Maddisons, Milly worked as a Personal Assistant for a multi-national events company. Milly’s strengths are keeping everybody organised and keeping things moving which is much needed in the busy Maddisons offices.