Prepare to Sell Your Home for Top Dollar with these 7 Tips

Thinking about selling your home? Take some time and prepare to sell your home first with these 7 tips.

1. Clean Clean Clean!

   If you don’t do anything else, do this! This is one of the most common things everyone knows to do to prepare to sell but they don’t always do it right. Sellers are used to their home. They are there a lot and don’t really look at things like buyers do. As a result, they overlook some critical items. As you clean, pay special attention to items like the grout in your shower, the light switch covers, the windows, and the baseboards. Are doors or stair rails dirty where they are commonly touched? Are there odors and items lying around from pets or kids? Does the carpet look worn? We want the buyer to be excited to bring their things into this house, not stress about all the dirt they can’t see.

2. Make Minor Repairs.

   Minor repairs are often looked at as insignificant or petty. But just a few small items make a buyer begin to wonder if the home has been neglected. They will see one dripping faucet or a door that sticks and start to notice other items. Stretch the carpet and repair ragged edges, repair blinds that don’t open or close right, touch up the walls and trim that didn’t clean, replace burnt out light bulbs.

3. Reduce Clutter.

   As you prepare to sell, we want to make your home feel as big as possible. If you have too much stuff, even a large home can feel small. Take everything you can off the kitchen counters and minimize the amount of knick-knacks you have on shelves and tables. Accent pieces are wonderful to make a house feel homier but too many and it has the opposite effect. Don’t overlook the closets and the garage. Buyers expect closets and the garage to have stuff in them. Having too much stuff will make the buyers wonder if there is enough storage or if their car will fit in the garage.

4. Open the curtains and blinds.

   Nothing is worse than walking into a dark house in the middle of the day. When all the curtains and blinds are drawn the home feels dark and small and odds are, the buyer won’t even turn on the lights. Unless it’s really dark, they’ll just look at it in the dark. Buyers may not even look out the windows. Sometimes there are fantastic mountain views out the windows but the buyers may not even notice. The best features of the house should be easy for a buyer to notice not hidden from sight.

5. Make your home look like a show home.

   The best impression a buyer can have in your home is that it has been staged and no one lives in it. It makes it easier to see it as their house. That can be a tall order when you do live in it but there are a few things that you must do. Make the beds. Don’t just pull the covers up but actually make the bed. Add decorative pillows and put the items on your nightstand in the drawers. Put away your make up or skin care items. Many women leave the items they use daily on the bathroom counter. Hang shower towels neatly on towel racks or on hooks after use. Don’t hang them over the shower door or on a towel rack without folding them like you would a fresh towel. It’s convenient to use the excuse, “the buyers have to realize someone lives here” but don’t use it, instead make them wonder if someone lives there.

6. Shovel walks, clean up the exterior.

   Buyer’s look around while they are waiting for the door to be unlocked. Don’t give them concern about the rest of the house by making their first impression a bad one. In the winter, make sure, every time it snows, you or someone else is shoveling the sidewalk to the door buyers will be entering. Make sure areas for potential ice dams have heat tape and it is on. When it’s not snowing, make sure you or someone else is pulling weeds and landscaping isn’t overgrown. Mountain landscaping is acceptable here but that doesn’t mean out of control is okay. Make sure there’s no peeling or weathered paint or stain and clean up spider webs. Take a minute to stand outside your front door and take a good look around. Then address anything that could be a concern to buyers.

7. Hire The Mountain Living Team.

   A good real estate agent will not only put your property in a good light for potential buyers and agents but will be able to handle any issues that may come up once you are under contract with a buyer. We help you get your property ready for market, then take wide angle photos and get you maximum exposure in print and internet avenues. We monitor showings and feedback to make strategic adjustments when necessary. And we use our experience to avoid common pitfalls when negotiating offers, getting your home under contract and keeping it there all the way to Closing.

Your home may already be in tip top shape and nothing much needed or you could be looking at quite a time commitment to get your home ready. Many of our buyers and sellers live out of town and we realize how difficult it can be to coordinate everything from afar. We invite you to utilize us as a local source of help. We will help you with finding and scheduling cleaning companies, contractors or a handyman and anyone else you may need.