Getting your home ready for the market
- De-clutter. This is essentially straightening up, putting away, removing items and organizing your home including closets, basement and garage areas.
- Repairs: It is important to take an inventory of the condition of your home and make a list of items that need attention and make sure everything is working properly.
- Furniture placement. This is looking in each room and making sure you do not have too many pieces of furniture and that the furniture you do have works in the room and brings out the best in that room from a function and visual perspective.
- Cleaning. I think one of the most critical aspects of getting ready is making sure your entire home is as clean as it can be including appliances inside and out. This would not be your normal maid service cleaning. It would mean moving furniture, washing baseboards, cleaning blinds, wiping down cabinets, cleaning appliances, scrubbing bathroom commodes and tiles etc. I would suggest having this done by a professional.
- Painting. Outside of cleaning fresh paint is one of the most important aspects of preparation. It is one of the best ways to make a home look fresh and crisp. If you cannot or do not want to afford an entire paint job then I would focus on the rooms that need it the most and the most important rooms; kitchen, family, foyer, rooms with lots of light that can show wear and tear. Even if you think you want to do it yourself. I would consider getting an estimate on a touch up job by a professional they are good at matching paints and using techniques to get the best results. Areas to focus on besides general walls are loose or cracked caulking, dirty baseboards and trim.
- After all of the above is completed I would then suggest cleaning your carpets, wood floors, vinyl and ceramic floor tiles.
- Outside. Very important to have the outside looking crisp and fresh as possible. It is the first thing a purchaser sees when coming to view the property. Important to refresh the mulch, weed the flower beds, paint or clean dirty surfaces and trim trees and bushes.
- Make decisions on what if any upgrades should be completed such as windows, counter tops, replacing older appliances. This can indicated if you are competing with homes of similar prices that have been upgraded, but you need to be careful to not over improve or do things that you cannot get back in the asking price. Sometimes these things need to be done just to compete with other properties.
