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I'm searching for ideas and thoughts on what to do to get a house ready for market as cheaply as possible. I have a friend who is a realtor who will list for a nominal comission instead of the usual 5 or 6 % because she is just building her business. What I want to do is expand on what we have already done (new kitchen appliances over the past 2 years and paint). I want to get the most bang for the buck. We need carpet, we have new exterior doors front and back, new shutters, we have painted most of the interior house (we have to finish the laundry area and touch up a few things). What else can we do and keep it under say, $1500? Any thoughts and ideas would be great, especially if it's something others wouldn't typically think of. TIA
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If you are selling with your "stuff" still in it, the best thing we ever did was put about 1/4 of what we owned into storage. It made the rooms look bigger and more open. Also, a hint that our realtor told us was to go and buy candle warmers..and buy candles that are homey (sugar cookies, pumpkin pie, that sort of thing) and to make sure to have them on for a full hour before a showing. For some odd reason, people put a lot into the type of window treatments a house has, too. You might consider blinds in every room, if they aren't already. Also, ceiling fans in all bedrooms was something we always looked at...stupid since they are cheap to put in ourselves, but it was something we always noticed!
PS...LOVE your avatar! Can I have him?!?!? I collect elephants.
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Well, when we sold our house we really only touched up, we did not repaint any rooms. Our house was 7 years old, so luckily the exterior needed nothing none other than a power washing!
Clearing out the clutter in closets, drawers, and cabinets is important. We put our house on the market in December, and immediately, I mean before we even had a lock box on the door, had an offer. If fell through due to them not having THEIR buyer buy their house. Anyway, I packed away all the Xmas stuff in Jan. I labeled each box with a number. I wrote the number in a noteook. Then I put the general contents in the next column, and if any explanation was needed in the 3rd column I wrote what room it'd go to in the new house. So we had a storage area in the basement, and put the boxes in there. And i went through all my closets, etc. and packed away serving trays, summer outdoor plasticware, linens, etc. Stuff I knew was truly NOT needed until we moved.
I also put away a LOT of knickknacks that were out on display, even if they were on a tabletop and I knew it was moving along with me! To give the appearance of more space. We also packed a lot of the kids toys, which really helped when they called and wanted to show the house immediately.
I'd make sure everything is neat and tidy, the bushes are not overgrown, etc. I am sure your friend has some good ideas. It helps to have someone else come in with a critical eye, as sometimes we live with those little imperfections and are so used to them, but it may be something that the potential buyer is going to notice as needing fixed.
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When my parents sold their house the #1 thing they were told to do was to paint everything, and do get rid of all of their clutter. Towards the end there was nothing in their house. And when we bought the house we are in now the woman who sold it had it pretty much empty when we came into it to veiw.
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We got a storage space back in September and have been clearing out stuff for months, Christmas was just counterproductive and we limited what the kids got from everyone, too The window treatment thing is good. I got rid of blinds because the kids were too hard on them, I found them needing to be replaced too often so I have roman shades in every room. Keep the ideas comming, Ladies!
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When we sold we just decluttered. Maybe pack your nichnacks and your personal pictures. make the house look generic so the buyers can picture their stuff in the house. Make the house as clean as possible, Maybe invest in some nice wlcome door mats and some nice bath mats, kitchen rugs, candles and maybe some fake plants in the corners of the rooms. If you really want it to sell dont invest too much money into fixing it for somebody else to enjoy. I always noticed I liked the cleaner and less cluttered houses more than the cluttered ones when viewing homes.
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clear out every closet to the minimal you need in there. completely clear off yuor counter tops. if replacing the carpet is out of the question, just give it a good cleaning. a good idea to instead of the candles, is sprinkle some cinnamon on a tray and pop it into a warm oven for a few minuites and then leave the door open a crack and the smell will go throughout the house and smell yumy. when we sold our house i made up a batch of cookie dough and froze it and then poppeda few into the oven a half hour before the viewing and then set them out on aplate with a note taht said help yourself,a dn i also put alittle warning thatn they may contain nuts. the people who looked at our house loved that touch. and it was even a factor in selling our house lol. clean all the windows, and leave your shower curtain open in the bathroom it makes it look more spacious, and less like your hiding something.
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Definitely the painting will help. Pick a warm, neutral tone. Some neutrals look "cool" but warm tones are generally feel more homey. Carpet is a good idea if your carpet is in bad shape and/or a non-neutral color. Again, pick something in a neutral color. People don't want to think they'll have to replace carpeting when they move in.
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I think painting in neutral colors is good, although I have to say about the 'good smells'...try not to overdo it. I don't like any scented candles and some folks really did a lot of those and you start to think, what are they trying to cover up? At least I did, I think less is more in that department.
Decluttering is always good, we bought our second house before we sold our first, so we were able to move a lot things out but if you can't do that, definately consider a storage unit or basement of a friend/family member to clear some things out.
We're looking at houses right now actually and we'll buy our next one before we set this one up to sell but we're planning on doing some painting to freshen things up, clearing out all the closets, setting up the rooms to look really spacious, clean and bright.
Good luck to you!
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1) Clean, clean, clean
2) Purge, purge, purge
When we bought our first house 2 years ago (after being married for 8 years) we looked at tons of places. This one was the first one we saw that was spotless and had no clutter! We put an offer on it that day!