Take a Cue from the Pros & Get Your House Sold!
Getting ready to sell? Many people list their homes, go through the inconvenience of making it available for showings, and then wonder why it hasn’t sold after 2 or 3 months. That’s the wrong way to go about selling a home. You have to prepare your house before it is shown to the first Realtor or buyer. Your best time to get an offer is that very first week your home is on the market. If your home doesn’t shine, Realtors and buyers won’t come look again. Even people who discover it for the first time will wonder why it’s been on the market so long. Many will conclude that it’s overpriced, whether or not that’s the case.
One of the most important things you can do is to make sure your home shows like a model. New home builders know how to stage a home. Take a look at the video above, featuring San Diego new homes by Brookfield. Don’t they look warm and inviting? Your home probably looks inviting to you – after all, it is your home – but you need to take a step back and make it inviting to people who don’t already love it.
First, make sure it doesn’t look crowded. Take all the stuff off the kitchen counters. Get rid of furniture, especially any furniture that’s too big for the room. You are going to be moving anyway, so you might as well start packing now? Put it in a storage unit - it will be well worth the cost if you can sell your home quickly. When you’re deciding how much stuff needs to go, don’t use the current situation as a starting point. Instead pretend the house is empty. Now what would any home need? A couch, an entertainment center, a kitchen table, a bed in each bedroom? It doesn’t need all your cds, your knick-knacks, a sewing machine, a bean bag chair, etc. A buyer wants to imagine their belongings in a new house. Make sure they see lots of room to put their stuff. Don’t forget the closets. Buyers will look to see how much room there is. If the closets are full to the top, they’ll think this home has insufficient space.
Next, make it neutral. Anything that’s personalized could be a wrong fit to a buyer. If you have a room painted burgundy, paint it off-white before you list your house. Look at the model homes. Any kind of buyer could imagine moving into these homes. The buyer will personalize it their way over time, but it has to be at least okay to them now.
Make sure there’s plenty of light. Add light fixtures, buy additional lamps, or open the drapes. Light helps make your home look bigger and more neutral.
Curb appeal means how your home looks to buyers when they first see it - from the curb?If the front of the home is boring, buyers won’t be enthusiastic about seeing the inside. If it is messy or overgrown, they will start the showing with a negative feeling. The Realtors who show your house won’t help the buyers past that. They’re human too. They’ll show their buyers houses that they’re excited about. The first impression is incredibly important, so don’t skimp here.
Fix the little things. Are there cracked tiles? Do trees and shrubs need to be trimmed? Is the kitchen sink chipped? Buyers don’t even realize why they’re turned off when a home doesn’t sparkle. A new coat of paint goes a long way.
Here is the hardest part. It is your home. It’s almost impossible to look at it with an impartial eye. It would be a good idea to have somebody else assess the situation. You could hire a professional stager. You could hire someone to do it for you, or to evaluate and make recommendations. Or you could find an impartial person to evaluate it. Your Realtor might not be the best choice because they don’t want to offend you and possibly lose you as a client. It should be someone who isn’t familiar with your home. Otherwise they’ll have the same problem you have. You have to be willing to hear what doesn’t look good about your home, and that’s difficult. If you can steel yourself to do that, your house will sparkle for the Realtors and buyers who come to look at the newest house on the market. You will be rewarded with a better sale price and a quicker sale.
Rockrose new homes Carlsbad is the newest community by Brookfield San Diego. Come by and see how well these model home show.
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