We-buy-any-house companies (often called WBAH or quick-sale firms) offer to buy your property in 7–21 days. So does a traditional auction. The price difference is the part nobody advertises.
The headline numbers, side by side
For a hypothetical £200,000 property:
| | WBAH cash buyer | Traditional auction | | --- | --- | --- | | Initial offer | £160,000 (80%) | Guide at £190,000 (95%) | | Final offer / hammer | £150,000 (75%) | £194,000 (97%) typical | | Seller fees | £0 | £0 | | Completion | 7–21 days | 28 days | | Seller nets | £150,000 | £194,000 | | Difference | | £44,000 |
How WBAH offers actually work
- Initial online offer at ~80% of "market value" — a figure they generate from automated estimates.
- Survey during the "free no-obligation" period, used to reduce the offer 5–10%.
- Final offer typically lands at 70–78% of the open-market figure.
- Pressure to accept fast, citing "fall-through risk" if you don't.
The discount is real and not always wrong — for genuine 7-day completions on properties an auctioneer would struggle to market, it's a legitimate service. The issue is most sellers don't realise auction matches the speed at a much smaller discount.
Why auction often nets a smaller discount
The features that tend to narrow the gap on the right property:
- Competitive bidding rather than one-sided negotiation
- A buyer pool of investors and cash buyers willing to act in 28 days
- No revaluation after initial offer — the hammer is the price
- No survey delays — buyer-beware contract
These don't make auction the right answer for everyone: the buyer pool is smaller and investor-led, the hammer isn't guaranteed to reach your reserve, and a property that would appeal to owner-occupiers can do better on the open market through an estate agent if you can wait.
When WBAH genuinely makes sense
A small set of cases where auction can't beat the 7-day completion:
- Repossession is days away. Auction's 28-day completion may be too slow.
- Probate creditor with a fixed deadline. Same issue.
- Property is unmortgageable AND unsuitable for investor purchase. Rare; usually a sign of title defects best handled separately.
In these cases the speed a WBAH company offers is the thing you're actually buying, and the discount is the price of it.
The conversation to have
Before choosing either route, it's worth ringing a regulated auctioneer and asking:
- "Could you complete on this property in 28 days?"
- "What hammer price range do you expect?"
- "What's your fall-through rate on lots like this?"
The answers let you compare a realistic auction outcome against the WBAH offer on the table, so the decision is based on numbers rather than the pressure of a deadline.
Try the calculator
Sale method comparison
Why we built this comparison
Your Property Check exists to help sellers compare their options honestly. Both WBAH and auction are legitimate routes that complete quickly — WBAH fastest, auction at a smaller discount — and the right choice depends on your timeline and your property. The underlying data is public, and the comparison usually takes one conversation and a few minutes with a calculator.