Jennie Bailey’s friends thought she was “bonkers” when she told them she was raffling her family’s £325,000 home for £5 a ticket.
Her family has lived in what was originally their holiday home for two-and-a-half years after deciding to swap their lives in Manchester for the “slower pace” of the seaside village of Rhoscolyn on Anglesey.
But the two-bedroom flat is becoming a bit of a squeeze for Jennie, her husband John, 45, their sons Harry, 11, and Sebastian, nine, and cocker spaniel Dylan.
With the boys “craving their own space” and, after 12 months of having the property on the market and dropping the original £365,000 asking price by £40,000, the family decided they could no longer sit and wait for it to sell.
“I was getting a bit stressed about it,” said Jennie, 43.
“I thought ‘let’s think outside the box and try something a bit different’.”
The family’s flat, which Jennie and John originally bought eight years ago as a holiday home, is one of three inside a converted house, with Jennie’s brother owning the ground floor flat where their family stayed when Jennie was a child.
“I’ve been coming here since I was two. We spent all our summer holidays here, so I’ve kind of grown up here,” said Jennie.
She gets “quite emotional” at the thought of leaving but, after her father died last year, she realised it was time for a new chapter.
One of Jennie’s best friends sent her a link to an article about a woman in Ireland who raffled off her home and the idea stayed with her.
“My first response was ‘don’t be so stupid, there’s no way in the world I’m doing that’.
“But curiosity got the better of me and I spent probably a month really researching it. I got loads of legal advice, which was really difficult to get because a lot of people just don’t understand it.”
Jennie and John had to take the property off the market when they set up the raffle using an online platform.
Tickets are £5 each and their goal was to sell 150,000 in six months, with a deadline of 1 January.
Even if they do, they won’t get £750,000 as 10% goes to the platform, as well as costs such as legal fees, stamp duty and marketing.
As of Friday, the family had sold 50,531 tickets.
If they don’t hit their goal, they’ll keep the property and the winner of the raffle draw will get half of the pot with the other half going towards covering costs, then the family can keep anything left.
Jennie said friends had told them about negative comments online and in person surrounding the raffle, including the cost of the flat and the fact they are not originally from the area, but “I’ve just ignored it all”.
She added: “We’re genuinely just a family who are trying to sell our property in a bit of an unusual way.
“It gives a chance for someone who might not be able to buy this kind of property – £5 is like a coffee these days.
“If you don’t like it, just don’t enter.”
Jennie said “only a low percentage of people actually complete” after doing this type of raffle, but she was staying optimistic as the latter stages of the raffle tended to be when more tickets were sold.
She said the experience had been “a complete learning curve” as she had no idea how to approach marketing or the other skills needed before attempting it.
“I work on this every day. Some days all day long, sometimes at night,” said Jennie, who also runs a handmade home decor business, while John works from home as a packaging designer.
“It’s really hard. I don’t know whether what I’m doing is right or not, I’m just literally trying anything and everything.
“Would I recommend it? If you can be quite thick-skinned and just carry on, then yes, do it. But you’ve got to devote time to it.”
Stelios Kounou, founder and CEO of global raffle technology firm Raffall, said the first house raffle on his platform took place in 2020 and, since then, it had hosted 54 UK and Ireland house raffle attempts, 18 of which had resulted in the property being exchanged.
“I don’t see this becoming a trend,” he said, adding house raffles were not something he had thought about when first setting up his company.
“People who do this know probability of success might be low but, for those willing to put in the hard work, the time risk is worth the possible reward.”
The Bailey family plans to stay in the area once they sell the property, but Jennie admits they’ll miss the beach view.
“It would be amazing to see someone else enjoy this like we’ve done. “
