How To Get Your House Ready To Sell

Preparing Your House To Sell: Ultimate Checklist

When it’s time to sell your home, you have many things to consider. There are a lot of things to do, and it can seem overwhelming. You will go through the financing process, deal with lots of paperwork, arrange the home move, and much more.

But even with everything you must do to prepare for the move, there are important steps you should take to get your home ready to sell quickly and improve your offers.

We look at the steps that can make finding a buyer easier and help you get to the right price.

What are Home Buyers Looking For?

While you might have improved your home, these may not help you sell. Your decor choices aren’t necessarily to the taste of potential buyers. You can easily overlook things you get used to, and these things could put off many buyers. When you’re selling your home, you should consider how your property looks to first-time visitors.

Your real estate agent should be able to offer advice about changes you can make to improve the sellability of your property. But you can also try to put yourself in the shoes of someone visiting your home for the first time. This can allow you a better understanding of what buyers will see and think about your home.

Creating the Right First Impression

When a buyer arrives at your home, the first thing they see is the outside of the property and your front yard. If the curb appeal leaves a bad first impression, it may not matter how great the inside is. 

Improving curb appeal can be as simple as tidying your front yard. Trim the hedges, cut back the trees, and mow the lawn. Ensure any unsightly problems are removed. Check the lighting and clean the lamp housings as necessary. Pressure washing the driveway, paths, and sidings can make a significant difference to the appeal of the outside of your home.

If the exterior looks tired, you don’t necessarily need to repaint the whole house. A fresh coat of paint on the front door can do wonders to improve the appeal. Consider buying a new welcome mat and some potted plants to enhance the entrance to your home.

Even if you have tidied your front yard, perhaps it needs a little more color. New flowers planted in the flower bed or pots can add a welcome burst of color to make the home stand out.

Depersonalize Your Home

When you put yourself in the position of the buyer, you will realize that your family photos don’t hold the same meaning to other people. Remove any personal items like photos, souvenirs, and children’s drawings.

A depersonalized home is easier for the buyer to imagine living in. It more easily allows the buyer to imagine their possessions in your home. And, if they can imagine living in your home, they are more likely to make an offer.

Declutter and Deep Clean

Leaving clutter around your home is very convenient for everyday living, but it isn’t what buyers want to see. It will be more difficult for them to imagine their furniture in the home when it’s cluttered with your stuff.

Anything you don’t immediately need should be packed away and stored. Use this opportunity to sort through your stuff and throw away or store anything you don’t need. This will make moving easier and less costly, with fewer boxes to transport to your new property.

Removing unneeded items of furniture will make the home seem larger. If you don’t have anywhere else to store this furniture, renting a storage unit for a few months could be your best option.

Looking at the home with fresh eyes might reveal areas that could be cleaner. While it is easy to become accustomed to issues like these, they will be noticed by potential buyers. A deep clean will deal with the issues you are aware of and those you aren’t.

You can always hire an expert cleaning company to tackle this step if it feels daunting. They can also clean the carpets, which could remove odors and brighten up the room.

Light Up the Room

If the room seems dark, it won’t be as appealing. Remove thick curtains that could block a lot of light during the daytime. New brighter light bulbs can also help improve the situation, making the room more welcoming.

If a room still feels dark, you don’t need to knock a hole in the wall for a new window, just add additional lighting. Adding a lamp in a dark corner could make a huge difference to the room’s appeal.

Staying Neutral

If you have picked a bold color scheme in some of the rooms, there’s a good chance this won’t appeal to buyers. Though it might seem boring, repainting with neutral colors will make it more sellable.

Small Repair Jobs

If you’ve been living in the home for a while, it’s easy to put off minor repairs. A leaky tap might not bother you, but a buyer will notice it. Though this isn’t a big deal it is a mark against your property. These small issues can mount up and make a difference in the buyer’s decision.

Making Major Renovations

Making significant changes to your home could attract more buyers. When planning to sell your home, investing in renovations and improvements might seem like a good idea.

However, it usually isn’t worth the time, expense, and headaches involved in major renovations to make the home more sellable. Most of the time, you won’t see the home sale price increase to cover your renovation costs.

Is the Price Right? The Importance of a Good Real Estate Agent

The price your home is listed for can make a big difference to how long it takes to sell. Even in a seller’s market with more buyers than homes, overpriced property can sit in the listings for months.

The longer your home sits in the listings, the less attractive it will be to potential buyers. Even if the reason is because it is overpriced, it’s easy to think there could be other significant problems that deter buyers. This usually leads to the price being reduced, something that wouldn’t have happened if the right asking price had been chosen in the first place.

Your real estate agent can use comparable sales data to help you choose the right price. This analysis will consider differences in properties sold recently in the same area, to help you get the best price for your home. 

The price your home is listed for is just part of the marketing strategy. Your listing agent should have a plan to to help you sell your home quickly. This marketing plan might include social media, an open house, and a competitive listing price to make your home stand out.

To make sure you choose the right real estate agent, you’ll need to ask them a few questions before you agree to work with them. Asking them how they intend to market your home should tell you a lot. Also, check their ratings online to see what previous clients think of them.

If you choose a great real estate agent, they can expertly advise you on the changes you should make to your home to get the best price that attracts buyers. Your agent should be an advisor who will add value by guiding you through the home selling process. The sooner you can hire someone like this, the more likely you are to achieve the best selling price.

Stage Your Home: Hire A Professional 

After you have cleaned and decluttered, your home could be staged to make it easier to sell. Home staging can be done on a budget, or you can hire a professional. It can be as simple as placing throw cushions, lighting a few candles, and buying fresh flowers.

If you hire a pro, they might bring in new furniture, decor, artwork, and mirrors to turn your home into somewhere buyers can envisage themselves living. Research suggests that staging significantly increases the value of offers and finds buyers faster. While there is an extra cost to using a professional, it might be worth it.

With the home staged, professional photographs will make the most of your listing. A professional photographer will ensure your listing grabs buyers’ attention and showcases the best aspects of your home, increasing interest in your listing. To further make your listing stand out, a virtual tour is another option to consider after staging.

Should You Have Your Home Inspected?

While most buyers will want to hire their own home inspector, there are some benefits to a pre-listing inspection. When you are selling, having it inspected offers some advantages:

• Uncover hidden problems. There could be things revealed in the buyer’s inspection that delay or even end the purchase. If you know about potential issues you can make repairs or adjust the listing price accordingly.
• Reassure potential buyers. With a home inspection report to show buyers, they can feel more confident in choosing your property. While they may still have their own inspection, it reduces their risk and could be another reason to shortlist your home.
• Prevent delays. With less chance of significant problems found in the inspection report, the closing process is unlikely to be delayed.

Choosing to hire a home inspector will cost hundreds of dollars, but can make your sale more successful. Your real estate agent can advise you whether this is a good idea in your situation.

After Your Home has Been Listed

Once your real estate agent starts marketing your home, there are still some things to do. Your agent probably has other clients, and some things will remain your responsibility anyway.

If you are still living in the home, you must ensure it is kept clean and minor maintenance tasks dealt with. Showings can happen at short notice, and you may not have time or be available to clean the home beforehand.

You need to be flexible once you put your house on the market to allow buyers access when convenient. This may mean being prepared to leave the house at short notice for an hour to allow a showing to take place. If you have kids, you’ll have to keep them entertained and have things planned. If you have dogs, you shouldn’t leave them in the home during the showing.

Other Things You Can Do to Sell Your House Fast

Whether your home is easy to sell or not, often depends on factors out of your control. But even if the local housing market is challenging, there are things you can do to improve your sale:

• If the local market is difficult for sellers, you may have to consider pricing your home more competitively.
• Some times of the year, like spring and summer, are easier to sell in. If you have the choice of when to list your home, ask your real estate agent when the best time to sell is.
• Offering incentives to buyers, like paying some of the closing costs, can help when there are fewer buyers.
• Consider offering a home warranty, so that appliances and systems in the home won’t be a worry for the new buyer.
• Open houses can help you find a buyer and you may need to have these events more than once. While there are some downsides and their effectiveness is debatable, it might be necessary if the home sits on the market too long.

Even if you do everything right, selling your home isn’t necessarily going to be easy. It can take more time than you would like, and you might not get the price you think you deserve. You need to try to be realistic and focus on making your home look its best for buyers.

Summing Up How to Get Your House Ready to Sell

If you want the best price for your house and your sale to go as smoothly and quickly as possible, there are things you can do. If you give yourself the time to get your home ready to sell, selling your home will be less stressful, and you’ll get the right price.

About the author: This article was written by Luke Skar of MadisonMortgageGuys.com. As the Social Media Strategist, his role is to provide original content for all of their social media profiles as well as generate new leads from his website.

We provide award-winning customer service to clients who need to purchase a home or refinance an existing mortgage.