Here, Greg Davies, branch manager at Philip James Wilson, explains how The Heatons and Didsbury became the go-to neighbourhoods to buy your home
The property market showed no sign of letting up over Christmas and New Year, and we’ve plunged straight into a busy January! The popularity of The Heatons area continues to rise unabated, especially at the top end of the market.
Beautiful and spacious Victorian, Edwardian and 1920s houses set on generous plots are very much in demand across Heaton Mersey and Heaton Moor, as well as parts of Heaton Chapel and Heaton Norris too. We are also seeing a number of modern homes come to the market, which appeal to buyers looking for a low maintenance option.
Offering extra visibility
This year, Philip James Wilson is marketing all of its properties not only from our Heaton Moor office, but also from our Didsbury office. This ensures every single property has extra visibility across South Manchester which means more exposure for our vendor’s property leading to a higher sale price within a timescale to suit.
Figures from 2016 showed that Philip James is the leading agent in Greater Manchester for high end homes, selling 35% of all properties on the market in Didsbury and The Heatons between £500,000 and £1 million, which means we have direct access to more high net-worth buyers looking for an exclusive home. On top of this, our Heaton Moor office sold more than £60m worth of property in 2016, achieving an average of 98.5% of the asking price.
This shows that anyone selling their house with us will have significantly more exposure and visibility to more prospective buyers than with any other local estate agent. Essentially, our vendors are getting two estate agents for the price of one because all of our properties are marketed across both state-of-the-art offices, with large window displays and halo lighting for 24/7 window viewing.
Prime Positioning
Our large and spacious office on the corner of Wilmslow Road and School Lane is in the heart of Didsbury village, capturing passing foot traffic day and night. Additionally, we have a new office in West Didsbury on Burton Road, which will further increase the marketing and exposure of all of our SK4 properties. Our sales teams over the border in Manchester are well-versed on the benefits of living in The Heatons.
Village Charms
Due to the popularity of programmes such as Cold Feet, Didsbury is a well-known suburb to anyone moving from another city or another area, so is often be the first port of call for a move. A lot of buyers don’t know much about other similar areas, such as The Heatons, with the same leafy village feel. This is why it’s ideal for our Didsbury sales teams to dually market our SK4 properties across their database.
In addition to this, we see many families with children approaching high school age looking to move to a catchment area for the best state schools. Priestnall School in Heaton Mersey is OFSTED rated as an ‘outstanding’ school and is a first choice for many families in the area. We have very close links with all the schools in this area and sponsor the football kits for the boys’ and girls’ football teams at Priestnall School.
Top Transport Links
Furthermore, many prospective buyers simply don’t realise how easy it is to commute from The Heatons to the city centre or further afield. With Heaton Chapel train station just two stops from Manchester Piccadilly, and the fairly new East Didsbury tram stop serving Heaton Mersey and Didsbury Road areas, transport links are really excellent. Stockport train station is on the mainline to London, with the Virgin Pendolino making it to the capital in just over two hours.
Last year, we also pioneered our weekend viewing events to showcase prime properties across SK4, which were massively successful and will be continuing this year. They are not as stressful as open days, with viewers booking appointment slots throughout the weekend to ensure they have the time to view the property in detail. However, it also creates a feeling of competition with viewers and we normally achieve a number of very good offers over that first weekend for the vendor to consider.
We’re thrilled to be a part of this thriving community and looking forward to finding dream homes for everyone who chooses to make this area their home.
Please do give me a call if you have any questions about selling your home or about the area itself.
E: GregDavies@philipjames.co.uk
Call: 0161 431 5556
