Dec
If you’re selling your house, you have to do several things to ensure its ready for a smooth and easy sale. You can hire an estate agent, interior stager or complete sales teams to sell your house – or you can do it yourself.
Houses are considered to be easiest to sell when they are clean, tidy, free of clutter, and the walls are neutrally toned – some sites and experts suggest painting your walls white, others suggest that you should paint them with pale, neutral, matching colors. If this isn’t possible, it is important to make sure your walls are clean – removing clutter and cleaning woodwork and painted walls, can give your room a much needed lift.
If you’re de-cluttering, you can also begin packing whilst doing so, but considering some houses sell up to three months before you’re planning on moving OR up to a year after you’ve moved, its also important not to plan to sell straight away, unless your house is in a highly sought after area, and you’ve got a good, competitive price. If not, you might be in for quite a wait on selling your house – and you also have to find a new place to move to yourself.
Estate agents, and Realtors do a great job of selling houses, but in an ever increasingly competitive market, you have to do very unique things to sell your house – it has been reported that some people are offering new cars, or paying the tax on your house for the first year of your stay in the new house. The housing market is always expanding, but you can’t sell just anything – dilapidated houses can’t simply be considered ‘fixer uppers’ and all houses for sale have to meet ever increasing stringent codes – or have new owners that will fix these to meet those codes.
Painting, and Decorating
Painting, decorating and other ways to make sure your house is in a good condition to sell.
House selling has become a very competitive market, and though people are desperate in some areas to buy a house, its important you take care to ensure that the you’ve done all you can to make your house as attractive, safe and saleable as possible.
It is said that the average house buyer has no vision which means you need to make their ‘envisioning’ themselves within the house as easy as possible. Dark paintwork is a definite turn off, as are stained, worn or smelly carpets, both of which need to be taken care of.
On the latter, you could offer an ‘allowance’ or remove a fraction of the house costs for carpets or, if you can, invest yourself and replace them, to allow a possibly higher sale price. Walls should be painted off white, or antique white or possibly very pale and pastel shades if you’re planning on redecorating you may have no option if your walls are stained, marked or damaged.
Its also a good time to ensure that everything that you’ve been meaning to repair is taken care of is actually done a faulty stair tread, banister or fence in the garden may only be a minor annoyance to you, but can be a danger to anyone looking at the house.
Its hard to sell your house without help, but one of the biggest tips you can take to ensure your house sells is to make sure you’ve removed your ‘imprint’. Looking at the house impartially, remove anything that screams ‘my personality’ and ‘my personal space’.
Things like photos, pieces of unique artwork, and ornaments and more can be removed before people come to view the house. Remember they want to buy the house, not feel how you lived there, so if you haven’t finished boxing up your non essentials by the time you start showing them the house, its time to consider whether you really need the clutter still unpacked or whether its time to put it in the bin.
John Pawlett
http://www.articlesbase.com/non-fiction-articles/preparing-your-house-for-sale-95533.html
18 Responses so far to "Preparing Your House For Sale"
December 4th, 2009 at 5:41 am
I’m in the process of preparing a house for sale, and needed a second opinion on these ideas…?
I was thinking that maroon carpet, cottage cheese ceilings with glitter, and formica countertops would look great. Oh, and I found this wonderful southwest wallpaper in mint green and peach.
I think it will look awesome, and add a lot of value. What do you think?
How about a chandelier made of antlers?
December 4th, 2009 at 10:43 am
very funny.
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December 4th, 2009 at 10:45 am
Perfect. Make sure you have a dead lawn and lots of clutter.
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December 4th, 2009 at 10:47 am
i hope you’re joking but if you’re not NO! i watch a lot of real estate and do it yourself shows and they constantly say when preparing to sell, do not stray away from neutral. keep in mind, why spend the money on things YOU think would look great. you won’t be occupying the house. it’s a lot easier for people to walk into a neutral setting and think of what they want to add then to sell when they walk in thinking "this carpet has to go, this has to go"
and no offense but i don’t like the colors you’ve picked anyways!
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December 4th, 2009 at 10:49 am
Dang! Where’s this house? I’m buyin’ it!
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December 4th, 2009 at 10:51 am
No I couldn’t disagree more. You need to keep the space neutral, it doesn’t matter what you like, because YOU are SELLING the home. I say take the cottage cheese and glitter off. Don’t do wallpaper at all it lowers the home value, and so does the counter tops. Best of luck!
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Interior Designer
http://www.dwelldesignbuild.com/
December 4th, 2009 at 10:53 am
Wow….
Remember when you are selling a house you need to appeal to a wide array of different tastes. Most people are not big fans of wallpaper. Also you want to stick to neutral colors. Formica counter tops are o.k., if they are not too off the wall or dated.
It sounds to me that you have a lot of work to do.
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December 4th, 2009 at 10:55 am
be prepared for a long wait until a viewer, let alone a buyer, comes forward……….
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December 4th, 2009 at 10:57 am
you need cactus and white rock for whole front yard–curb appeal!
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December 4th, 2009 at 10:59 am
Your 30+ years behind the times you need to visit some new model homes for new Ideas.
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December 4th, 2009 at 11:01 am
I have a tire that would make an excellent flower bed for you.
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December 4th, 2009 at 11:03 am
May I be so bold as to recommend a toilet bowl flower pot on the front porch… they always lend an aire of sophistication…
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December 4th, 2009 at 11:05 am
Does the rusted out Camaro on blocks in the front yard come with the house?
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December 4th, 2009 at 11:07 am
I have an extra velvet portrait I can send you if you give me your address. It should fit right in as the finishing touch.
http://schronlisa.files.wordpress.com/2008/04/dogs-playing-poker.jpg
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December 4th, 2009 at 11:09 am
don’t forget to put up the outdated Christmas decorations outside…. O and a large plastic rearing horse in the middle of the front lawn
you’ll sell quickly
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May 19th, 2010 at 10:28 am
Great info, thanks for useful article. I am waiting for more
May 20th, 2010 at 5:35 pm
What template do you use in your website
December 22nd, 2010 at 7:15 am
Thanks a million for this, I appreciate the info