1. Remove Excess Furniture

There is such a thing as having too much furniture. While you might not think that large, L-couch negatively affects the room, it takes up a lot of space. The more space your furniture takes up, the smaller the room looks and the harder it is to notice the details of the room. To help open up your home, remove any excess, oversized, or unappealing furniture. To have your furniture ready and accessible for your new home when the time comes, rent a small self storage unit and keep everything safely packed away. The more minimalistic your home looks, the better. Just don’t go overboard and put everything away.

2. Remove Personal Items

When potential buyers walk through your home, they try to imagine their family living there. They don’t want to be reminded that yours still does, or ever did for that matter. For this reason, one of the number one rules of selling your home fast is to remove any and all personal items. Even if you’re still going to be living in the home during the selling process, removing pictures, children’s artwork, any religious or political items or memorabilia, toys, or other personal items helps the buyers. If they can see themselves living there, they’re more likely to make an offer. If your home has a lot of personal items and photographs and you don’t want your home to feel “empty” after removing them, simply replace them with some inexpensive art. The more you depersonalize your home, the better.

3. Declutter Rooms

The last, and most time consuming, things you need to remove from your house is clutter. Clutter, even organized clutter, will not help you make a sale. The less you have scattered around, the more calming your home will be. Again, minimalistic interior design is the most successful for expediting the home selling process. Some other things you should remove from your home include rugs, over sized drapes or window treatments, bathroom accessories, and anything on your kitchen counters. If possible, try to remove as many appliances as you can. When people open drawers or closets, it’s nice to see the open space. Similarly, try to keep only the clothes you need at your home when it’s being shown. This helps depersonalize the room even more.

4. Do a Deep Clean

After you’ve removed excess furniture, personal items, and any clutter, do a deep clean. You can do this first, but we find it’s much easier to clean your home when there are fewer things to move around. If you put your home on the market and it’s dirty, then open house is not going to be successful. Like we mentioned, people like to imagine how it would feel to live in your home during a walk-through and if it’s messy, it will not go well. Get out your cleaning supplies and make sure you don’t overlook any nooks or crannies. Get inside of cabinets, closets, and shelves and don’t neglect the windows, bathrooms, basements, or garage.

Since carpet is one of the first things people see in a room, make sure you give off a good impression. Rent a carpet cleaner and deep clean every room in your house. If you don’t have the time to do it yourself, or would prefer a professional job, hire a reputable company.

5. Consider Repainting

When you’re cleaning, if you can’t get any scuffs of the wall or the paint is outdated, consider repainting. Repainting is a small investment that will greatly enhance your home’s overall value.

If your home is extremely outdated, you might also want to consider making some renovations. This doesn’t have to be anything major, but even small changes can do wonders for value. To get the most out of renovations, walk into your home, take a look around, and try to think about what a homebuyer would do first if they bought your home. If it’s reasonable, do it.

6. Maximize Natural Light

Natural light makes everything look better, so try to maximize it during showings. If your open house is during the day, keep all of the window treatments in the house open. This will make the spaces look larger and more welcoming. If there are a few rooms that lack sufficient natural light, use lamps strategically to create the right mood.

7. Take Really Good Pictures

If your home is listed online, people will rely on the pictures you post to decide whether or not they want to visit it in person. Since almost half of homebuyers today start the search for their new home online, you need to take really good pictures. If you take poor quality pictures, people won’t want to see it in person. Take pictures that highlight the different features in your home. While smartphones have come a long way in image quality, they’re no comparison to professional cameras. To make sure your pictures are the best they can be, we recommend hiring a professional photographer. Check to see if your real estate agent offers free photography included in their marketing prices.

8. Offer Evening and Weekend Tours

Sometimes, buyers struggle to make time for daytime visits. People usually want to look at more than one home and if they work full-time jobs, this can get tough. To open your home to more potential buyers, offer evening and weekend tours. The easier it is for people to see your home, the faster you’ll be able to sell.

9. Set the Right Price

Overpricing is the primary reason that a home stays on the market for extended periods of time. The longer your home is listed at a high price, the harder it will be to get discovered. You’ll eventually have to drop the price and start over, which causes skepticism from buyers. When a listed home keeps dropping, people usually just assume that something’s wrong with it and skip over it immediately. To avoid this, you need to set the right price.

This might mean having someone appraise your home, but when you set the right price your home will sell much faster than when you overprice it. Use a home value tool if you don’t want to hire a professional and check the current market data for an objective resource and comparable prices.

10. Communicate with Your Neighbors

The people that live in your neighborhood probably care about you leaving and someone new moving in. People are invested in their community, so take the time to communicate with your neighbors. Just the simple act of networking could mean a larger buyer pool. Similarly, share your listing on social media or through relevant email lists. The more people that know about your listing, the more will visit.

11. Focus on Curb Appeal

When people drive by a home with a “For Sale” sign, they’ll get a quick glimpse at your house from the exterior. If the curb appeal isn’t appealing, they probably won’t stop. You don’t have to go over-the-top and hire expensive landscapers or re-do your front porch, but you should keep things well kept. Maintain your lawn, plant some flowers, and add fresh mulch to start. If your front door, lighting fixtures, or mailbox is old and obviously deteriorating, consider making a small investment to update things. The effect of making minor changes to increase curb appeal will be worth it in the long run.

Once your home is sold, you’ll need a new one to move into, so you might as well build your dream home. At Trade Mark Homes, we’re committed to turning the vision you have of your dream home into a reality. Our team will work with you from planning through construction to deliver craftsmanship that exceeds your expectations.