Preparing Your Homes for Sale

Making necessary repairs

The first step in preparing your home for sale may seem relatively obvious, but many home sellers fail to realize the importance of completing basic repairs. Unless you plan to sell your home as a "handyman's special" or a "fixer-upper," you need to make sure it is in good shape. After all, most buyers do not want to buy a house that requires additional work before they can move in.

Keep in mind that making repairs does not mean making additions. Investing money into additions is not usually a good strategy if you are doing so for marketing purposes. If you spend $5,000 on a new deck, for example, you are not likely to see a $5,000 increase in the value of your home. The only time you should do major renovations and improvements is if your home is significantly out of date or not on par with other homes in the neighborhood.

Creating Curb Appeal

The first step in preparing your home for sale may seem relatively obvious, but many home sellers fail to realize the importance of completing basic repairs. Unless you plan to sell your home as a "handyman's special" or a "fixer-upper," you need to make sure it is in good shape. After all, most buyers do not want to buy a house that requires additional work before they can move in.

Creating curb appeal involves focusing primarily on the outside of your home. This includes assessing all of the following:

• Making necessary repairs
• Creating curb appeal
• Staging

At a minimum, your landscaping should be comparable with the landscaping of your surrounding neighbors. Your landscaping must also be well maintained, with all of the bushes properly trimmed, grass cut and collected, leaves raked, weeds pulled and clutter removed.

Creating curb appeal also involves cleaning your windows – both inside and outside – as well as cleaning the front door and repainting it if necessary. Be sure to polish the door fixtures and to ensure the lock and key work properly. Your front door is often the very first thing a buyer notices. The same is true of your exterior paint and siding. If the paint is chipped and faded, repaint the house before you put it on the market. Painting a home does wonders for curb appeal and is usually an economical investment. If you have siding, rent a power washer and clean it thoroughly.

Even if your backyard is not readily visible from the road, you still need to keep it neat and tidy. Make sure your lawn and garden beds are properly maintained, while also keeping backyard fixtures such as swimming pools and Jacuzzis clean and maintained.

Staging

The final step in preparing your home for sale is to stage your home. Staging involves depersonalizing the home while also decorating the home in a way that helps the potential buyer visualize himself living in the home. Since buying a home is a largely emotional experience, your goal is to help the buyer make a positive emotional connection with the house.

To stage your home, you first need to remove personal items, such as photographs and souvenirs. While all of these things help to make your house a "home" for you, they make it difficult for the buyer to picture anyone other than you living in the home. Obviously, this serves as a major roadblock in helping the buyer visualize himself living in the home.

Staging also involves removing clutter and helping the home appear as spacious as possible. In some cases, this requires removing certain pieces of furniture and placing them in storage. Your goal should be to make the house easy to navigate while also appearing welcoming and inviting. In other words, potential buyers shouldn't have to squeeze past furniture or through doorways to move from place to place. At the same time, furniture should be positioned in such a way that they want to sit down, relax and enjoy spending time inside the house.

When removing clutter, you also need to make sure all of your closets and cabinet drawers are well organized. Rent a storage unit for extra items if necessary. Overflowing rooms, cabinets and closets give the impression that your home is small or does not have enough storage space.

The final steps in staging your home involve adding those simple decorative touches that make your house feel like a home. A vase with fresh flowers on the kitchen table, scented candles and decorative throw pillows all help to create the right mood and atmosphere. You should also pull back the curtains and pull up the shades so the natural light can shine in your home as you are showing it to potential buyers.