Sell Your Flat Quickly
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- Sell your flat in as little as 6 days
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Content Written By: Raphael Kaye - Last Updated: 28/03/2025
The Property Buying Company once completed a flat purchase in just 6 days, but on average, it takes around 125 days to finalise a flat sale. Compared to companies like Quick Move Now, which report that selling on the open market takes about 220 days, this means homeowners can save over 2.5 months by selling through The Property Buying Company.
In 2024, the company took an average of 100 days from offer to completion when buying flats, apartments and maisonettes across England and Wales. While it’s not quite the “sell in as little as 7 days” promise that often catches attention, it’s important to understand that those 7 day sales happen in special circumstances – like when a flat is facing repossession.
What makes The Property Buying Company stand out from the rest, is the flexibility they offer. Customers are free to decide how quickly — or slowly, they want to sell. Whether you need a quick 7 day turnaround, a few weeks, or even a few months, the team tailors their service to fit your timeline. It’s all about giving sellers the breathing room they need to make their next move without unnecessary pressure.
Check out this video below to see The Property Buying Company’s process works:
We’re honoured to have been featured in the media by several leading outlets and major publications
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What issues are flat owners facing?
Selling a flat in the UK has become increasingly challenging, leaving many owners frustrated with the current housing market. According to the Office for National Statistics, 2021 census, where they collected data from households across England and Wales, flats, maisonettes, and apartments make up around 21.7% of all householders in the UK, with 4.86 million out of 5.4 million being leasehold properties.
Leasehold flats, in particular, can be notoriously difficult to sell due to a range of issues, including:
Short leases
If your flat has a short lease, selling it can feel like an uphill battle. Buyers will often ask you to extend the lease first, and honestly, who can blame them?
Most banks and mortgage lenders are pretty strict when it comes to lease lengths, especially if it’s under 80 years. Here’s what some of the mainstream banks require:
Nationwide: They’re all about longer leases, especially for new build flats, and usually want at least 125 years on the lease.
Barclays: They typically look for at least 70 years left at the start of the mortgage.
Santander: They’re okay with 55 years at the start, but only if there’s at least 30 years left when the mortgage ends.
The tricky part? Extending the lease gets more expensive the shorter it gets, which can be a massive financial strain – extending at 85 years can cost £5,000, but extending at 60 years can cost £38,000.
This can make selling a flat with a short lease incredibly difficult, especially if you’re hoping for a fast sale. If extending the lease isn’t an option for you, it might be worth exploring other ways to sell, such as using a cash house buyer.
Lower resale value
Flats just aren’t as in-demand as they used to be, which is making it tough for owners to sell and move up the property ladder. Compared to houses, flats have seen slower price growth, and demand has dropped.
In fact, according to the Financial Times, flat sales have dropped by 25-33% over the past three years compared to where they might have been if values had continued to rise steadily. This has left many flat owners struggling to build enough equity for their next move.
The Financial Times attributes this decline largely to the post pandemic “race for space,” where buyers have been prioritising larger homes over smaller flats, leading to a significant drop in demand for these properties.
Adding to that challenge, high mortgage costs and expenses like Stamp Duty have made things even tougher for flat owners. In cities like London, it’s now common to see flats listed for less than their original purchase price, showing just how much values have fallen.
Mortgage restrictions
Most mainstream mortgage lenders are cautious about lending on certain types of flats, such as those with:
Unsafe cladding (EWS1 certification required).
Short leases.
High density ex-council blocks or properties with complex management structures.
These restrictions mean fewer people can buy your flat, which slows down the process and limits your options.
The landlord exodus
A lot of landlords are leaving the rental market because it’s no longer as profitable as it used to be. Tax changes, rising costs, and stricter regulations have pushed many to sell their buy to let flats.
This flood of flats hitting the market has created an oversupply, giving buyers more choices than ever, and as a result:
Sellers are having to lower their prices just to stay competitive.
Some owners feel pressured to spend money fixing up their flats to attract interest.
Flats are taking longer to sell, leaving owners feeling stuck and stressed.
The combination of too many flats for sale and not enough buyers has pushed prices down even further. If you’re in a position where you need to sell quickly, working with a cash buying company like The Property Buying Company could be a good option to help you move on without the usual hassle found on the open market.
The Flat Leasehold Problem
Whichever way you look at it, selling a leasehold flat is more difficult than a freehold, and of the 4.5 million leasehold properties in the UK, 69% of them are flats.
Inherently, that means that most flats in the UK are leasehold properties - but being a leasehold property in itself isn't what causes the issue when it comes to difficulty selling, it's the key difficulties that come with leasehold property ownership.
Negotiating leasehold extensions can be difficult and expensive, meaning potential buyers avoid buying properties with short leases. This process can sometimes even lead to leasehold disputes.
There's more paperwork with selling a leasehold, meaning generally, the process of selling takes longer.
Ground rents can be high and subject to increase.
The same is true of service charges, this can often put buyers off.
You must comply with the terms of the lease.
All of these factors make it far more appealing for potential buyers to purchase a freehold property, limiting the pool of potential flat leasehold buyers and increasing sale times.
Why is selling a flat hard?
Selling a flat or apartment on the open market can be more challenging than selling a house, especially if it’s a leasehold property. Many flats are considered “problem properties” because of short lease terms and the fact that owners don’t own the common areas.
Mortgage lenders tend to avoid these properties, particularly in blocks with more than five storeys. This is often due to safety concerns, such as overcrowding and cladding risks. Flats in ex-council blocks from the 1980s and 1990s are especially tricky because they’re more likely to have these issues.
What does this mean for you as a seller? Buyers need a mortgage — who make up around 53.8% of all house purchases – might not be able to buy your flat. This drastically reduces the number of potential buyers.
Even if a buyer can get a mortgage, selling a flat takes longer than selling a house. For example, between May 2023 and May 2024, it took an average 76 days to get an offer on a flat, compared to 63 days for a house, according to Belvoir.
And, if you take into account, the fact that on average, selling a house in 2024 took around 185 days from start to finish. For flats, though, the process tends to be even longer – currently averaging 220 days. That’s an extra 95 days of waiting you could avoid by selling your flat to The Property Buying Company for cash. While we typically average around 79.32% of the market value for flats, the speed and simplicity of our service can make a huge difference.
To give you an idea, over the past five years, we’ve made offers totaling £90.6 million for flats, apartments, maisonettes, and studios. Helping people sell these types of properties quickly and without stress is something we’re genuinely passionate about.
The Flat Market Statistics
As we alluded to in the previous section, flats take longer than houses to sell, and when we say sell, we mean agreeing a sale; this doesn't include the legal process to complete, which is typically also longer due to the additional required documents.
The table below compares flat sale times to the most common property type, terrace houses, for the largest 5 cities in England:
| City | Flat Sale Days | Terrace Sale Days | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Birmingham | 175 Days | 105 Days | + 70 Days |
| Leeds | 143 Days | 109 Days | + 34 Days |
| London | 158 Days | 114 Days | + 44 Days |
| Manchester | 122 Days | 73 Days | + 49 Days |
| Sheffield | 150 Days | 68 Days | + 82 Days |
Statistics by Home.co.uk and correct as of March 2025.
The Flat Selling Checklist
With selling a flat being a little more complex than a standard property, we've put together a checklist of the information that may be required throughout the sales process - having this checklist to hand will help increase the speed of your sale.
How to sell your flat quickly
If you’re looking to sell your flat quickly, the best thing you can do is find a mortgage-free buyer. This makes the whole process faster and much more secure, cutting out a lot of the stress and uncertainty that comes with an estate agency sale.
When you sell on the open market, most buyers will need a mortgage to afford your flat. That’s where delays start. The mortgage approval process can take anywhere from 2 to 6 weeks, and if your flat has issues like a short lease, cladding concerns, or is in an ex-council block, it could drag on for months.
For example, lenders will likely demand an EWS1 certificate – even if there’s no actual issue with the cladding, which can hold things up indefinitely.
And, here’s the tough part; until contracts are exchanged, there's a 33% chance the sale could fall through. If that happens, you’re back at square one, starting the whole process over again. It’s frustrating, stressful, and can feel like a waste of time.
Our CEO, Karl McArdle added, "Selling a flat isn't always straightforward, even after you've managed to agree the sale itself, then the actual conveyancing process can be dragged out due to the increased amount of required documentation from multiple sources, which can increase fall-through rates. This is why a large portion of our enquiries are made up of customers who have had a chain break on their flat."
That’s why going with a mortgage free buyer, like a cash buying company, can be a game-changer. With no mortgage approval process to deal with, the sale can move forward quickly and smoothly.
Take The Property Buying Company, for example. They offer a 99% success rate once they’ve made you a cash offer. What they offer is exactly what you’ll get – no surprises. Even better, you could have the money in your account within 48 hours of completing the sale.
Selling a flat on the open market can be slow, uncertain and stressful – especially if your property has complications. Using a cash buyer takes away the hassle, giving you a quick and straightforward way to sell and move on with your life.
The Property Buying Company will buy your flat fast
Selling a flat can be overwhelming, especially if you need it done fast. That’s where The Property Buying Company comes in, offering a range of solutions to meet your needs. The Property Buying Company is first and foremost, a cash buying company, so will therefore offer you cash for your property. If the offer doesn’t align with your goals, then they have other options available. Whether you want to sell your flat outright or explore other quick sale options, they’ve got you covered.
Over the past five years, we have helped people sell their flats, maisonettes, and studios in 125 days, with last year, the average sale taking just 100 days:
If your flat fits their criteria, they can buy it directly – thanks to their £10 million purchasing facility, giving you a fast and stress free sale. But even if they can’t buy it outright, they offer flexible solutions like:
Connecting you with their database of 3000+ cash investors who are ready to buy quickly.
Selling through their dedicated property auction, where competitive buyers can help secure a fast sale.
Listing your home through their online estate agency if you’ve got a bit more time to achieve the best price.
Here it from our customers:
With The Property Buying Company’s mix of speed, flexibility and trustworthiness, they make selling your flat as easy as possible. Whether they buy your flat directly, connect you with an investor, help you through an auction, or open market purchase, you can feel confident that you’re in good hands every step of the way.
Where do we service?
We work across England and Wales, so whether you’ve got a busy HMO in Birmingham or a cosy flat in the Peak District, we’re here to help. It doesn’t matter if your home’s in perfect shape or needs some TLC – we’re ready to buy.
Use our interactive map to find your area!
Questions to ask when selling a flat
Do cash buyers have to buy directly to be legitimate?
One question many sellers ask is whether a company has to buy directly to be considered a true cash buyer. The short answer? No. What really matters is that cash buying is the core focus of their business. Offering alternative solutions, like auctions, or investor matching, just adds flexibility and makes sure you get the best option for your situation.
My flat is in a bad condition, will you still buy it?
Yes, absolutely! We genuinely mean it when we say, “we buy any house in any condition.” While the condition of your flat might impact its value, it won’t stop us from making you an offer.
Because of how our company operates, we may buy your flat directly, hold onto it for a time, or sell it after some renovations. Renovation costs are factored into the cash offer we provide, but rest assured, the condition of your flat won’t stop us from helping you sell quickly and easily.
How quickly can we buy your flat?
If you’ve been searching for ways to sell your flat fast, you’ve probably seen claims from cash buyers promising sales in as little as 7 days – we make those claims too! But here’s the honest trust; while it’s possible, a 7 day sale usually happens only in rare cases, like when someone is facing repossession.
That said, we do move quickly. For example, The Property Buying Company’s fastest sale ever was completed in just 2 days! However, most of our customers choose the timeline that works best for them. Last year, our average sale took 113 days, which is still two months faster than the estate agency average for 185 days.
Here’s how it typically works:
We’ll provide you with an initial cash offer in 24 hours.
You’ll receive a formal offer within 5 days.
After that, it’s up to you – you can choose to complete the sale the following week, month, or whenever suits you best.
How do you value my flat?
In terms of cash buying, we will offer you on average around 80.39% of your market value, while our estate agency service will offer you 12%+ more! Our valuation process has three main stages to make sure you get a fair and accurate cash offer:
Initial valuation: Once you make an inquiry, we’ll talk to you about your flat and use cutting edge data tools to compare similar properties in your area. This helps us provide you with an initial cash offer.
Regional manager visit: We’ll send one of our Regional Managers to visit your flat. They’ll meet with you, take a closer look at your property, and ensure everything checks out. If all is in order, they’ll confirm the offer. And don’t worry if your flat is tenanted — we can work around that!
External RICS valuation: As a final step, we’ll arrange for an external RICS valuation to value your flat. This is just an extra layer of due diligence to confirm everything. Once that’s done, we can proceed to exchange and completion.
My flat has a short lease, will you still buy it?
Yes we will! Short leases can make things a bit more complicated, but we’re happy to work with you. If our initial cash offer doesn’t meet your expectations, you have options. You can choose to extend your lease and come back to us, or you can try selling through our open market estate agency. Either way, we’re here to help you find the best solution.
Are all cash buyers reliable?
Unfortunately, no, not all cash buyers are reliable. Some claim to be cash buyers but don’t actually have the funds – they rely on investor backing or, worse, use your details without your permission.
To avoid this, make sure the company you work with is a member of The Property Ombudsman and the National Association of Property Buyers. These memberships guarantee that the company follows strict industry standards, so you can sell with confidence.
Edit Log
28/03/2025 - Content edited by Raphael Kaye additional leasehold resources, market statistics, checklist and quotes.
28/03/2025 - Content updated in line with Editorial Guidelines (Reviewed by Mathew McCorry)
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