Seller Series: Preparing Your Home to Hit the Market

Congratulations! You’ve chosen to sell your home. Here’s a very broad overview of the home selling process and what to expect. RMG Real Estate agents are available to go over this process in detail with you, and are there to assist you with any questions that may arise during this process. We love to help our clients feel calm, cool, and collected through what can be a stressful time of selling your home. By proactively approaching the home selling process, it will remove much of the unnecessary stressors and can be quite fun to learn along the way together! So, let’s dive in a little deeper to see how the process works.

First, identify necessary repairs and make a plan to fix those. Buyers can see minor issues as something that lowers the value of your home, so making a plan to fix things like squeaking doors, jiggling door handles, or a window that sticks, can actually help you to receive a higher offer right off the bat. Additionally, a pre-sale inspection can help to make sure that all necessary home repairs are taken care of before the first potential buyer walks through the space. Talk with your agent on the pro’s and con’s of a pre-sale inspection to understand that process fully. Along those same lines, a little paint can go a long way! Whether you just touch up banged up trim or you decide to freshen up everything and take those dated colors out of your dining room and replace with something more neutral, paint can really help a space feel updated, clean, and appealing to buyers! If you just want to spruce up the main areas with paint, we’d recommend a neutral fresh coat of paint in the entryway, bathrooms and kitchen.

Second, be sure to clean your home thoroughly. This may seem obvious, but USUALLY the cleaner a home is, the better priced offer you will receive. You are welcome to deep clean your home yourself if you choose to, or there are home cleaning vendors that RMG Real Estate can recommend as reputable. And don’t just stuff things in your closets either. Beginning to pack up your possessions into storage bins and stacking them neatly in an appropriate location in your home will help even more. The more able that a buyer walking through the space for the first time can imagine THEIR personal items in the home, the more likely you will be receiving an offer right away. With that, we’d recommend depersonalizing the space, such as taking family photographs off the walls, children’s art projects off the refrigerator, storing your DVD collection away, etc. One challenge people have is to keep the home clean throughout the time that it is on the open market. You never know what day a buyer will want to do a walk through, so keeping your counters clutter free and wiped is a huge help for those last minute showings. Keep your vacuum and broom accessible for a quick daily tidy of high traffic areas. 

Staging is another critical part of the home selling process. RMG agents can definitely assist you with ideas in this area. To get started staging your home for sale, after removing most of the personal items, create a single focal point in each room. It’s not about overpowering your space with decorations, it’s about drawing the eye to what you want to highlight as features in that room or suggesting a purpose for that room, such as a simple desk in what could be a home office for example. Another aspect of staging is the exterior to help create curb appeal. A fresh cut lawn and freshening up the mulch in the flower beds before your first open house will help set a great first impression. 

Lastly, trust the process! If you have gone through what to expect in the home selling process with a RMG Real Estate agent, just trust that this has been done before and can be done for selling your home! Yes, it can be daunting, but don’t let the details overwhelm you. Simplify your home, help the buyers to see themselves in your space, and remember that the right buyer is out there, whether they come through on the first showing or several showings after the house goes on market. In the next blog, we’ll touch on what happens after an offer is accepted but until then, happy selling!