Orange Steps markets homes most buyers can't see yet.

Not formally — not until an owner instructs an estate agent and goes to market. They intend to, and they're preparing to. Some will consider an offer before then; some won't. Until contracts are exchanged nothing binds either side, which is true of any sale in England and Wales.

Most will, and usually within a year — often much sooner. But some owners change their minds, and some sell before they ever get there. If the timing matters to you, ask the seller where they've got to; it's the sort of thing they'll usually tell a serious buyer.

Because these homes aren't on the market yet, and not every owner is ready for their neighbours, their employer or their children's school to know they're thinking of moving. How much they show is their choice. If you're seriously interested, ask — most will tell you.

Portal listings come from estate agents, and these owners haven't instructed one yet. When they do, the home will appear there — along with everyone else's attention.

Where one is shown, treat it as the owner's current thinking rather than a fixed asking price. An agent will advise on a figure before the home goes to market, and it can move in either direction. Some listings don't show a price at all yet.

On some of these homes, yes. If it isn't clear from the listing, ask the seller. There's no agent to put it through and no memorandum of sale at this stage, so it's an informal conversation between the two of you until solicitors are involved.

Possibly, though nobody can promise it. A sale agreed now carries no estate agent's commission, which leaves room that wouldn't otherwise exist, and some owners value speed and certainty enough to take it. Others can wait, and will. What you get for certain is the absence of competition.

You hear first — when a date is set, a price moves, or the owner decides to go ahead. That's it, and it's worth having. It isn't first refusal, and we don't sell priority to anyone.

Often, yes. It's the owner's call and depends how far along they are — some are happy to show people round early, others want the place finished first. Ask through the home's page and you'll get a straight answer.

No — you're exactly who this stage suits. An owner weeks or months from market would usually rather know now that a real buyer exists, and your timing may shape theirs. Say where you've got to and be honest about it.

Yes. A home here may not come to market, may arrive at a price that doesn't work, or may take months. Being early is an advantage, not a reason to pause your search.

Yes, and it's less exotic than it sounds. Nothing in English or Welsh law requires an estate agent to be involved in a sale. What you do need is a conveyancing solicitor on each side to handle the legal transfer — and that's a job the agent never did anyway.

Most of it happens before the offer: marketing the home, finding buyers, running viewings and getting a price agreed. Afterwards they write the memorandum of sale — a summary of who is buying what, at what price, with both solicitors' details on it. It isn't a legal document and isn't binding on anyone. Then they chase: solicitors, surveyors, lenders, the chain. The legal work itself — searches, enquiries, contracts, exchange, completion — belongs to the solicitors from beginning to end, agent or no agent.

Agreeing the price between you. Satisfying each other that you are who you say you are and that the money is real — your solicitors will check this properly too. Writing your own memorandum of sale, which in practice is an email setting out the property, the price, what's included and both solicitors' details. Booking the survey and the lender's valuation. And the chasing, which is the real one: with nobody in the middle, the phone calls to the solicitors are yours and the seller's to make.

It's the part that most often goes wrong, yes. English conveyancing tends to stall through waiting rather than disagreement, and a sale with nobody pushing it can drift for months. The consolation is that two motivated people chasing their own solicitors are usually more persistent than an agent juggling forty other sales — you care about this one more than anybody else does. But it is work, and better known now than in week nine.

The same way you should anyway: sold prices for the street on the Land Registry, comparable homes currently listed, and a proper survey rather than the lender's valuation, which exists for the lender's benefit and not yours. An agent's asking price was never independent evidence — it was the seller's opening position.

Perfectly normal, and it's where most of these homes end up. If the seller would rather go to the open market properly, nothing about an early conversation is wasted — you'll simply be the buyer who got there first.

Not as a public search — each home is published as its own presentation and shared by its owner. If you're watching a particular area, email us and we'll tell you honestly whether we have anything there.

No. Orange Steps is free for buyers: no fee, no account, nothing to sign to look at a home.

Your message reaches the seller, and it stops there. You and the seller talk in a chat here on Orange Steps, so you can ask questions and get answers without handing your email address or phone number to a stranger. If the two of you later decide to swap numbers or meet, that's your call to make in the chat — not ours. We never share your details with anyone — not estate agents, not mortgage brokers, not anyone else — without your explicit permission, and we never sell them. Nothing you send here puts you on a marketing list.

Then you want the other half of this — Orange Steps exists to get a sale ready before you commit to an agent or a price. Start at orangesteps.com.

Tell us at info@orangesteps.com. We'd much rather correct it than have you turn up to something that doesn't match its photographs.