As many as 4.5 million homeowners with a four-bedroomed property are planning on marketing it as a three-bedroom home and describing their fourth bedroom as something else in a bid to cheat the 10 September three-bed HIP deadline.
The most popular way to remarket a fourth bedroom, according to 82 per cent, is as a study. The word ‘study’ could well become a code-name for a fourth bedroom on property’s particulars - and millions more homeowners could consider this technique now that the Government has announced that HIPs will be extended to include all three-bedroom properties put up for sale from September 10.
Other names that people would use to describe their extra bedroom include:
- Playroom – 21 per cent
- Games room – 15 per cent
- Walk in wardrobe – 12 per cent
- TV room – 6 per cent
- Library – 4 per cent
- Computer room – 3 per cent
Furthermore, with 89 per cent of Britons now using the internet to search for properties, and 73 per cent using the number of bedrooms as a way of filtering out irrelevant properties from a search, you may also run the risk of being missed by potential buyers.
Nici Audhlam Gardiner, head of mortgages at Abbey, advised: “While HIPs might seem a hassle, we think it would pay in the long run to play it a straight rather than going through this loophole. By remarketing your home as a two or three bedroom house with a study, you’ll become invisible to thousands of potential buyers that are searching online, specifically, for three or four bedrooms and above.
“You might also make your property seem over-valued as potential buyers will be comparing the price of your bigger abode against someone else’s, which is likely to appear to offer better value due to the reduced number of bedrooms.”
