Why Is It Taking Longer to Sell a House?
Something slightly strange is happening in the housing market. House prices haven’t crashed. Buyers haven’t disappeared. Asking prices even rose again in October, yet selling a house is taking longer.
Rightmove’s latest figures show that the average property took 67 days to secure a buyer in September 2026. In May, the same figure was 60 days. That means the typical wait for a buyer has increased by a week in just four months.
The Bank of England has been hearing something similar from estate agents around the country. Its latest Agents’ Summary says the residential property market has softened further, transaction numbers are below last year’s levels and, in some areas, down by double-digit percentages. It also specifically notes that sales are taking longer to complete.
So, if people are still buying houses, why has selling one become harder?
Buyers haven’t disappeared. They have more choice
Perhaps the biggest change for sellers isn’t the disappearance of buyers at all. It is the amount of competition for them.
Rightmove currently records an average of 65 properties for sale per estate agent, including properties already under offer or sold subject to contract. That figure has remained at 65 since June.
That creates a very different market from one where buyers feel they have to make an offer quickly before somebody else does. When there are plenty of properties to choose from, a buyer can afford to be patient.
They can view another house at the weekend. They can wait to see what appears next week. They can compare your kitchen, garden and asking price with several similar homes nearby.
If a property feels expensive, there is less pressure to overlook it.
For sellers, that means simply putting a house on the market may no longer be enough. Price, presentation and how the property compares with everything else available become much more noticeable.
Prices are still rising, but only just
The latest official house price figures also tell a more complicated story than either “prices are rising” or “prices are falling”.
According to the Office for National Statistics, the average UK house price was £273,000 in August 2026, around 0.9% higher than a year earlier –That sounds reasonably positive. But the rate of growth has been slowing. Annual growth was 1.2% in July, and August marked the fourth consecutive month in which UK annual house price growth had slowed. (Source) The national figure also hides some substantial differences.
Average prices in England increased by just 0.4% over the year to August, reaching £294,000. Wales saw annual growth of 3.1%, while Scotland recorded 2.9%.
London went the other way. Average house prices there were 2.2% lower than a year earlier, with the ONS pointing to particularly large falls in flat prices.
So while the average UK homeowner hasn’t watched their property suddenly lose a large chunk of its value, there isn’t much evidence of a booming market either.
The market is moving, but slowly.
Asking prices tell another part of the story
There is another figure worth looking at. The average asking price of a newly listed property rose by 1% in October to £371,015, according to Rightmove.
However, despite that monthly increase, the average asking price was still 0.1% lower than it was a year earlier.
This matters because asking prices are exactly that: what sellers are asking. They aren’t necessarily what buyers are willing to pay.
The house around the corner is listed for £375,000.
Another one nearby wants £390,000.
Yours has a bigger garden, so £400,000 doesn’t sound unreasonable.
But unless those properties actually sell for those amounts, they don’t necessarily tell you what your home is worth in the current market.
When buyers have plenty of choice, there is less room for optimistic pricing.
A property that enters the market too high may get plenty of online views but few actual enquiries. Several weeks later the price is reduced, but by then buyers who saw it when it first appeared may already have moved on.
There may be absolutely nothing wrong with the house, it simply started in the wrong place.
Finding a buyer isn’t the same as completing a sale
The 67-day Rightmove figure also needs some context.
It measures the time taken to secure a buyer.
It doesn’t mean somebody lists their home and receives the money 67 days later.
Once an offer has been accepted, there is still the legal and financial side of the transaction to complete.
The buyer may need a mortgage offer and survey. Searches need to come back. Solicitors may raise enquiries. Issues discovered during the process may need resolving.
Then there is the property chain.
Your buyer might be completely committed to purchasing your home, but they may also need to sell theirs first.
Their buyer could be relying on another sale.
Somebody further down that chain could lose a mortgage offer, discover a problem in a survey, renegotiate or simply change their mind.
Suddenly a problem several transactions away has become your problem too.
This is one reason the Bank of England’s latest report is particularly interesting. Its agents aren’t simply reporting difficulty finding buyers. They are seeing transactions themselves taking longer to complete.That distinction matters to somebody trying to work out how long moving home will actually take.
There isn’t really one UK housing market
National averages are useful, but they can also be misleading.
A seller in London is experiencing a very different market from somebody selling in Wales or Scotland.
Even within the same region, property type and local supply can make a significant difference.
The ONS says six of the nine English regions experienced slower annual house price growth in August. It also records London as the weakest English region, with prices falling 2.2% year on year.
The Bank of England is hearing a similar story from the market. Its September report describes greater pressure on house prices in London and the South East, with prices elsewhere generally barely rising.
This is why homeowners should be wary of treating an average selling time as a deadline.
If the national average is 67 days, it doesn’t mean something has automatically gone wrong on day 68.
The better comparison is usually with similar properties in your own area.
Has your house been on the market too long?
A slower market doesn’t necessarily mean you should panic and cut the price immediately.
But the type of interest you’re receiving can tell you quite a lot.
If your listing is getting very few enquiries or viewings, it may be worth looking again at the asking price, photographs and how the property compares with similar homes nearby.
If you’re getting plenty of viewings but no offers, listen carefully to the feedback.
Buyers may like the property but not see enough value at the current price. There may be something about its condition or presentation putting them off, or they may simply have found better alternatives.
If you already have a buyer but everything has stalled, that is a different problem again.
At that point the delay may have very little to do with your home and everything to do with mortgages, solicitors or the chain.
They can all feel like the same problem from the seller’s perspective:
“Why isn’t my house selling?”
But they may need very different solutions.
What if waiting isn’t an option?
For some homeowners, an extra few weeks or even a couple of months isn’t a major issue.
If there is no particular deadline and your priority is achieving the best possible open-market price, waiting for the right buyer may make sense.
Not everybody has that luxury.
Perhaps you’ve inherited a house that is sitting empty. You may need to relocate for work. You might already have another property lined up. A previous buyer may have pulled out.
Or perhaps the sale has simply dragged on long enough.
In those circumstances, selling through a traditional estate agent and property chain isn’t the only route available.
House Buy Fast purchases properties directly, so there is no need to wait for an individual buyer to sell their own home before the purchase can proceed.
That doesn’t mean it is the right option for everybody.
A direct property-buying company will not normally offer the same amount that you might potentially achieve by finding the best buyer on the open market.
There is a trade-off.
Instead of trying to maximise the sale price, the focus is on speed, certainty and having greater control over when the sale takes place.
For somebody who is happy to wait six months, that may not be particularly attractive.
For somebody whose first sale has already fallen through, who is paying bills on an empty property or who needs to move within a particular timeframe, the calculation can be very different.
House Buy Fast can provide a no-obligation offer, giving homeowners something concrete to compare with the traditional selling route rather than having to make that decision without knowing their options.
A slower market isn’t a broken market
The current housing market is difficult to summarise in a single headline.
The average UK house price is still slightly higher than it was a year ago. Asking prices rose in October. Buyers haven’t vanished.
At the same time, annual house price growth has slowed for four consecutive months, stock levels remain high and Rightmove’s average time to find a buyer has increased from 60 days in May to 67 days in September.
The Bank of England is also hearing directly from estate agents that transactions are down compared with last year and sales are taking longer to complete.
Those things aren’t contradictory.
They describe a housing market in which people are still buying, but have more choice and less reason to rush.
For sellers, that makes realistic pricing and realistic expectations more important.
And for homeowners who don’t have the time or appetite to wait for the traditional process to play out, it is worth knowing that there are other ways to sell.