Get Rid Of The Clutter!!!

Nothing turns off a prospective home buyer than too much clutter around the house they are trying to imagine living in.

Even if you have to rent a storage locker or a mini-storage shed it is better than having the living room, kitchen or bedrooms so full of junk the buyers cannot even walk around the rooms.

I had a listing that was not very large, but the sellers had huge furnature and way too much stuff in the living room. The were finally convinced to store the extra stuff in the garage (which is a step in the right direction). The living room was then opened up to foot traffic and looked much less crowded. The house sold in a couple of weeks after that. Plants in a home add a nice touch, but too many in places where they do not belong also need to go.

Getting the Interior of your Home Ready to Sell

Now that you have the exterior cleaned and ready for the home buyers to drive up and see, you can start working on the interior. Start at the front door. Is it old and beat up? Would a coat of paint help it look like new again? Is the hardware loose and worn? How about the entrance inside? Is it cluttered with coats, shoes, and umbrellas? First impressions are lasting impressions so start cleaning up all the extra stuff you have acumulated over the years and get those coats hung in the closet. How does your house smell? You are so used to it you probably cannot tell so have a friend come over and give it the sniff test. If you have smoked inside or have dogs that have had accidents on the carpet you are going to have to do some heavy cleaning. Buyers who do not smoke will usually just turn around and walk out if the house smells like smoke and you do not want to lose prospective buyers before they even get inside. Speaking of carpet, is it badly worn or damaged or is it just dirty? A good carpet cleaning can do wonders if it is just dirty, but if it is worn it would really be good to replace it. Some people think that they will just give a 'carpet allowance' so the buyers can choose what they want, but you will gain more money and time in the selling process with new carpet even if it is not high end material. Most buyers have no imagination and are turned off by the look of a warn, dirty carpet. Replace it with a nice non-offeccive middle of the road color and style. It will make you home more inviting and it will be one major item you will not hae to worry about in the negotiations.

Advantages of getting an Inspection before you List

Here is a great report from our guest blogger, Vicki from Rinehart Inspections. If you call her at (206) 901-1549 and mention you read about it on this blog you will receive a $100 discount off of your next inspection. Home inspections conducted prior to a home being placed on the market is one of the wisest moves a seller can make. The initial response from sellers when approached with the idea of an inspection done as the home is about to be put up for sale is amost always the same - "What?! Why would i want to do that?" Let's review a few of the most common concerns about Pre-Listing Home Inspections 1. "The buyer will not accept it." That is correct! The inspection done for the seller is not intended to replace the inspection done for the buyer. The purpose of the pre-listing inspection is to put the seller in control! Given that no good surprise can come to the seller during the home inspection, regardless of when it is done or whom it is done for, it makes perfect sense to get every strand of information as soon as it can be gotten. Bad news doesn't get better with time. If there is some bad news, or more correctly, some items that needs attention or might have an impact on the home's value, who better to receive that information than the seller? And when is a better time to receive that information than before the home is placed on the market? The simple fact is this - a home inspection at the time of listing will put the seller in the best possible position. With the complete and clear view of the home's strengths and weaknesses, the home can be marketed to the best benefit of the seller. 2. "I don't want to pay for the inspection" This is certainly understandable. The seller generally perceives that the inspection is intended for the buyer, hence, should be a buyer's responsibility. But to have the benefit of the information it must be paid for. Never have we had a complaint from a seller about the value of the inspection! In every case at the conclusion of a pre-listing inspection, the seller felt they had made a good choice in spending the money to get the inspection done. In most cases, the seller's feel good getting the peace of mind of knowing that no major event or expense will be uncovered by the buyer's inspector. And on the rare occasion when it is discovered by the pre-listing inspector that the roof is completely shot or there is some other big expense or danger, the sellers, while not happy to have the problem, are glad to have discovered it on their own terms. The small expense of the inspection is always less then the cost and aggravation of a hurried hunt to get something repaired or replaced after the home is under contract. Save the pain, spend the money. Get every home inspected prior to putting it on the market! 3. "The home is selling 'as is'." This may be the best reason of all to inspect at listing! If the home is being sold "as is", reduce your risk and liability as the seller by getting a pre-listing inspection. In order for the home to sell quickly and at the highest price, disclose every condition of the home. The inspection gives both the buyer and the seller the comfort of knowing that the home "is as it is". With a pre-listing inspection, there is a high likelihood that the home is as represented. Even in an "as is" contract, the buyer may still have their own inspection performed. If these two inspections are similar in content, it is rare the buyer will walk or counter offer. That, in fact, is the goal of the "as is" sale. Another concern of sellers is that they will have to repair every item that is discovered to be discrepant on the inspection report. This is simply not true. It would be true that every discrepant item needs to be disclosed, and those disclosures may impact value and hence asking price, but nothing need necessarily be corrected.

Preparing your home for sale continued...

To continue our discussion of how to prepare the outside of your home for sale, branches of bushes and trees that touch the siding or hang over the roof of the house need to be trimmed back. Home inspectors will write them up has a maintenance item and the leaves or needles will clog gutters and downspouts causing more inspector write ups. As long as we are talking about shrubs and trees, you should trim them back to open up the areas around windows and sidewalks to let in more light and to keep walkways clear. I showed a really nice house recently where the shrubs in the front of the house were so overgrown that we could hardly walk past them to get into the house. Besides having to brush up against the wet bush, it made the front porch look like it was part of a jungle and very dark. Another problem that is easy and cheap to fix is to look for wood siding or decking touching the dirt. All you need to do is push the dirt away and clean off the wood. The home inspectors really watch for that 'earth contact' as it causes rot in the wood and real expensive damage if not corrected. The last item is the moss on the roof. This is sometimes more than the average homeowner can handle, but with a little moss killer sprinkled on the ridges of the roof, most of the moss will die off and blow or wash away in the weather after a month or so. Moss will distroy a roof and all inspectors will write it up as a repair item. Most of these fixes are very expensive to fix and most homeowners can do the work themselves for little or no money. Next time we will start on the interior of your home to get it ready for sale. d

Getting Your Home Ready to Sell

Remember - When selling your home, First Impressions Are Everything To ensure a successful sale of your home, it is important to present your property so that it will make a good first impression on all potential buyers. Here are a few suggestions on how to get the exterior of your home properly prepared for sale. 1. Look at your property objectively. Pretend you are seeing it for the first time through a potential buyer's eyes. 2. Keep the lawn trimmed and edged. 3. Put some new beauty bark in the flower beds and maybe add some new flowers to brighten up the entrance. 4. Keep the yard clear of hazards such as tools, toys, low hanging branches or hoses. 5. The front door and porch gives a vital first impression. Be sure they are scrubbed and repainted if necessary. Repair any loose stairs or railings. 6. Presure wash or touch up the siding and trim to give the front of the house a fresh clean look. It is amazing how some buyers will not even go in a house with a really messy yard or a bad entrance. It really puts a bad taste in their mouths so you have to make the street view a clean as possible to at least get them in the door. That first impression is so important that they may miss good features inside or if the outside is nice they could over look something not quite right inside. If you would like a room by room analysis of your home contact me at 206-214-5408 or check out my website www.DennisGouldRealEstate.com

Why Some Homes Sell

Check out this quick video on pricing your home. Of course each neighborhood and style of home will have its own price point, but this video talks about taking into consideration condition and pricing of homes "in the market" so they will sell, or 'out of the market' so they will just sit. You, as a home seller can not control the price the market will pay for your home, you can only control the condition your home is in to help attract buyers and to get the most you can for your home. Your real estate agent should be able to help you find that perfect price point where you will be able to sell your home and not leave any money on the table. I will be posting lists of key things buyers are looking for and what they run away from in the near future. Stay tuned and come back often. For more information go to my website www.DennisGouldRealEstate.com for neighborhood information and MLS searches so you can see what your competition is trying to sell their homes for.