If you own a home or plan on buying a home in the future, you will eventually have to deal with selling your home.
The ideal way to sell a home is to put it on the market and immediately get offers. The quicker a home sells the less time you have to deal with the stress of having a home on the market.
Even if you don’t plan on selling anytime in the near future – or don’t even own a home yet – it’s never too early to start thinking about the things you should do to make a home attractive to potential buyers.
Toady I have five tips that should help make your home sell quickly. Some are longer-term things you should build into your budget and plan; others should be done immediately before putting your home on the market.
1) Price Competitively
There are some houses that are “priced to sell” and some houses that are priced way too high. The initial pricing of a home will have a big impact on how quickly the home will sell.
There is no science to how a home should be priced. While you can reference comparable home sales to help guide the pricing, the market is constantly changing. If you want to get an idea of how much similar homes in your neighborhood have sold for, or how much they are on the market for, you can use Zillow. Zillow is great because you can also look at historical sale prices in your area for practically every single home.
More and more buyers are putting weight on what is called Zillow’s Zestimate. This is the estimated value of your home. If you are looking to sell be sure to take Zillow’s Zestimate with a grain of salt. I explained in a previous post as to why Zillow’s Zestimate can be misleading.
Keep in mind that if the buyer of your home is going to finance with a mortgage – which a majority do – the home will need to pass an appraisal. If the offer price is higher than the appraisal, the sale price will need to be lowered to the appraisal amount or the deal will fall through.
2) Clear out the Clutter
The less clutter there is in a home the bigger it looks. Beyond that, people won’t be distracted by how much stuff you have.
A couple specific tips:
- Get a Storage Unit – If it’s Winter and you have a bunch of camping and Summer-related items stored in your house, move them to a storage unit. Beyond that, consider moving toys, DVDs, furniture, and anything else that makes a room feel cluttered and cramped, into storage.
- Remove half your Clothes – Walk-in closets are a newer trend; they didn’t build homes with big walk-in closets until relatively recently. If your closets are small, consider taking half – or more – of your stuff out of them and putting it into storage. This will make your closets seem spacious – or at least “less small” – to potential buyers.
It may seem difficult or inconvenient to live in a home where a lot of your stuff is in a storage unit, but remember the goal: selling your house quickly. In an ideal world you would not have to have your stuff in storage for all that long.
3) Deep Clean
Deep cleaning is an important part of prepping your house to go on the market. This will become even more necessary if you have cats and dogs – their fur is everywhere and you don’t know if potential buyers have allergies.
The last thing you want is for potential buyers to be distracted. Don’t let them be distracted by a dirty house! Once deep cleaning is complete you just have to do light cleaning before each showing.
4) Upgrade the Bathroom and Kitchen
Updated bathrooms and kitchens are selling points for buyers. While an old and outdated kitchen or bathroom won’t necessarily deter potential buyers, a recently renovated bathroom or kitchen can really warm up the buyer to the house. When buyers see outdated rooms they start thinking about how long it will be until they have to pour money into a renovation, how ugly the old styling is, etc.
Renovating your bathroom and kitchen isn’t something that most people can do if they are pinched for time and need their house sold yesterday, but if you have a longer time horizon it can be something that helps you sell your home quickly when the time comes to sell.
Also, try to keep as little stuff in your shower as possible. When you know that someone is stopping by for a showing, clear everything out. Potential buyers don’t want to think about other people using the shower. Minimize distractions by minimizing your stuff that is visible in the bathroom.
5) Clean Up the Yard
If you’re putting your home on the market in the Winter when it’s covered in snow you can ignore this tip. If you are selling your home at a time where your yard and landscaping is visible you will want to make sure you do what you can to make sure your yard is attractive to potential buyers.
One house that I looked at when I was house shopping had a chain link fence between their house and their neighbors house. Unfortunately for the sellers, the neighbors had a bunch of junk on the other side of the fence. This is the main thing I remember about the house. A privacy fence along that side of the yard, or even some privacy landscaping, would have left me with a better impression of the house.
Having a lawn that is green and well-kept, functional landscaping, and a driveway that is in good condition, your potential buyers will be more drawn to your property. Having curb appeal is important because your front yard is the first thing buyers will see.
have you ever had to sell a home quickly? What did you do to make sure your home sold as quickly as possible once it went on the market?
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Photo by Boa-Franc
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Great tips! My boyfriend is getting ready to sell his house and he’s been fixing up the yard like crazy. He’s also going to paint and get new carpet so it can be priced at the higher end.
Deep cleaning is so important. When we were looking at houses, I got very turned off by houses that were dirty. It actually made it harder to see the positives of any house.
The home we currently live in was reduced 20k (below comparable recent sold properties) to sell quickly. The couple who lived there before us was going through a divorce and had to sell the house to settle the agreement. Because of that steep price drop it sold quickly. Nobody wants to lose money on the sale of a home but if the house has to sell quickly, a significant price drop is the best way to go.
I was always amazed when we were house shopping how many houses didn’t do simple things like deep cleaning and making sure it didn’t look like a war zone in their house. Of course, those were usually the ones that had been on the market the longest.
Upgrades are huge. It’s amazing what a difference some simple remodeling can make.
I think de-cluttering goes a long way. When we sold our first home that was a piece of advice our realtor gave us. She said that people want to imagine their stuff in your home and the more clutter you have, the less potential buyers can “see” their stuff in the home. Something else we did was light candles before people came to see our home and it was typically a lavender scent so people felt relaxed when they walked in. Almost every person who saw the home commented on how lovely it smelled.
I can’t stand a dirty house. While I was house hunting this was a big issue. Another were people who allow pets to poop in the back yard. Once I stepped on poop while viewing a home. I was not happy about that and the smell was disgusting. Why people think a house in that condition would sell is beyond me.
These are definitely great tips for selling your home quickly, but I do have to disagree with one thing… “If you own a home or plan on buying a home in the future, you will eventually have to deal with selling your home.” There are tons of people that will never have to worry about selling their home. I know people who still live in the house their grandfather built. Often times, if you own a house, you’ll keep it and it will stay in the family!
We are currently living in our first home right now. I can tell you from looking at houses though that the cluttered and dirty houses were an immediate turn off to us. It’s just too hard to look past all the stuff to get a good look at the house and imagine yourself living there!
theFinancegirl Those sound like some good things to do to get maximum value. Flooring is so important.
Holly at ClubThrifty I think I’m much better than the average person at looking past dirt and clutter. I think it works to my advantage when I’m in the market for a home. For most sellers, though, you’ll lose money and interest if you don’t clean and get some of the clutter out.
Brian @ Luke1428 It sounds like you got a great deal and I can definitely see how there are some situations where the seller wants to unload the house ASAP. There’s a price to pay in lost equity but sometimes it’s worth it.
FrugalRules If you go beyond just the simple cleaning, there were many homes we looked at that could have used various upgrades that would have made the home much more attractive to buyers. I’m not even talking expensive upgrades, just little paint jobs and whatnot.
brokeandbeau I agree! Especially when certain things have hit the point where a remodel is almost a no-brainer, it can make a huge difference interest-wise.
blonde_finance I definitely plan on clearing out our closets by 50% or more before we put our house on the market. Good idea about the candle, but I would never leave one lit if I was leaving the house! I’m to paranoid about fires.
Raquel@Practical Cents Haha okay the poop story is a bit funny but I also would be repulsed by the experience. I think I’m better than most when it comes to getting past the “dirty house” factor. We bought a house that needed some VERY deep cleaning before we moved in. Not sure we’d do it again, but I am a sucker for projects and things I think are undervalued.
Joshua Rodriguez While it may be true that you may never have to deal with selling your home, I would bet that 99% of the people who read this post and own a home will eventually sell it, if not 99.9%! Data shows that people today move many more times in their life than people 30 or 50 years ago.
DC @ Young Adult Money Joshua Rodriguez Hey DC. You know, that brings up a great poing. “99% of the people who read this post and own a home will eventually sell it, if not 99.9%”. I think you just gave me a great topic for one of the why bloggers fail posts. You obviously know your audience, and when you think about it, who else would be searching for ways to make sure their house sells quick other than people selling their house. Ah hah moment!
Excellent points, DC. We sold our home last Fall and used many of these same tips. I think it’s really important when you’re selling your home to look at with the same critical eyes you use when you look at other homes you’re considering buying. And that really means de-cluttering and neutralizing decor. If your budget allows it, I would also considering hiring a professional to clean your home. They can all the tools to do it incredibly well and clean things you didn’t even realize needed cleaning. Now you all have to do is maintain.
My husband (who is in the real estate business) were just talking about this recently with respect to our own home. My sis is undergoing a lot of renovations on their newly purchased home and it is taking some time and is quite a mess. Consequently they are living with us, part-time. On one of our walks, she said to me, why don’t you guys just sell your house as is and not renovate? Some people like to buy fixer uppers. It’s definitely tempting, to me. But my husband says we can get a really good price for our house if we renovate the kitchen and bathrooms, plus painting throughout and new flooring upstairs (currently, it’s carpet). We are in a really good location. I guess the open questions are (1) how much will it cost to do these renovations? (2) will the return be there to make living through it all worthwhile. I have to trust him because he’s in the business. Well time will tell when we get to that point. Four more years then we start our renovations and then downsize.
Cleaning, decluttering, and painting goes a long way for most prospective buyers. It sucks to move, so if you don’t have to deep clean or paint, I think that a huge draw. If you can sell quick, you won’t have to worry about having to lower the price. Great tips!
I have to add stage the home. We cleaned out the clutter and then staged the home like it should be. It didn’t cost us much but got our home sold in a short time frame.
Increasing the curb appeal with a nice manicured lawn. First impressions are important. Make sure you have a responsive agent and not an idiotic one,as they can often cost you the deal
My uncle used to flip houses and his trick was to clean as much as possible and to paint everything even if it looks brand new. Spend a few hours or days cleaning up, could save you time in the long run.
When my parents went to put their house on the market, a new coat of paint really helped! We did everything in neutral colors which seems to be the best way to go. We cleaned everything up and always had the house in good shape. My dad also gutted the bathrooms and they came out amazing. There are nice tiles available on a budget! We couldn’t afford a complete kitchen makeover, so we just re-did the floors and deep cleaned the appliances, but it still made a big difference as the old tiles were dirty.
We sold our law school house within a month of listing it. We felt really blessed considering many of our friends who were also graduating and moving across the country didn’t sell their houses and ended up renting them out.
We staged it nicely and put anything unnecessary in storage. Those who go through the house want to be able to picture themselves there, so getting rid of all your stuff really helps. Take AWESOME pictures.
Also, the first couple days your house is on the market it will get the most attention. Make sure your listing is complete and perfect before you list it. If you don’t have pictures, don’t bother listing it yet. You will miss lots of traffic if your listing isn’t awesome when it first launches.
Joshua Rodriguez Glad I could help you think of another blog topic! But yeah, most of my posts are written to rank on Google (or at least that’s my goal) so I would expect nearly everyone who reads this to plan on selling a home. With that being said, I also would be shocked if I met a 20- or 30-something who could honestly say they see no reason they would ever sell the home they currently own. That would be some crazy commitment!
BudgetforMore I try to use that to my advantage. I actually am more likely to put an offer on a house that needs work or is dirty, because I would hope to get it at a low price point. But yeah I kind of want our next house to be one that is turn-key – no projects needed!
ShannonRyan Great idea, Shannon! I think the ROI on cleaning your home when it’s on the market is incredibly high. Our house has some bigger projects that need to be done before it’s sold, but I definitely am thinking “down the road” to make sure I’m prepared if we do have to sell it sooner rather than later.
debt debs We are in the same spot where we need to replace the upstairs carpet flooring, renovate the kitchen, and renovate the bathroom. I’m jealous of my friend who is a teacher and has all Summer to renovate their bathroom. He does this with quite a few projects and literally has a TON of time to do it versus trying to rush it in a weekend or in a week.
Eyesonthedollar I think selling as quickly as possible should typically be the goal. I think too many buyers go into the home selling process thinking “I have to get x dollars, and not a penny less.” In reality if you are putting your home for sale you are at least somewhat motivated, and the buyer knows that.
DebtRoundUp Good to hear you got a good deal on staging! I know sometimes it can be pricey, depending on the house and what you need for staging. I’m also glad to hear that it sold quickly!
Charles@gettingarichlife I hear you on the agent. I think there are so many realtors these days that you deserve to have one that is good. We love the realtors that sold us our current home and we’ll definitely be using them when we list the home.
Aldo @ MDN Great to hear a tip from someone who flips houses. I think the newer and cleaner a house looks, the easier it will be for a buyer to see themselves moving in.
JourneytoSaving It sounds like your family put in quite a bit of work! While we hope to “slowly” renovate our house, as we have been the past year or so, we will have to tackle the bigger projects sooner or later.
SixFiguresUnder That’s great that you were able to sell your law school house. Great tips about having it ready to go when you list. There seems to be little to no benefit in listing it too quickly.
I definitely think clearing out the clutter is a big one. Some people actually look for cluttered houses and low ball because no one will buy them!
Wow over 400 shares on Facebook, that is massive :).. Really popular post here and great engagement..
I’ve never owned a place but have seen several family homes sold.. These were sold though in the standard 6 week period (at least this is the case here in Aus)
mycareercrusade Wow I just noticed that too! I didn’t even share it on our page yet! Unreal!
Six weeks is pretty standard here. When I put mine up for sale I really want it to go quick! I guess we’ll see when the time comes.
BudgetBlonde Haha I may or may not have been one of those people ;) I do find myself more attracted to homes that need a little TLC. I feel like the ones that show really well are the ones where the sellers are going to be pretty firm on their price.
Eric and I are considering purchasing a new home. Two weekends ago we looked a place that looked great from the outside. When we got inside the house smelled so bad I had to hold my nose. Their cat clearly wasn’t using the cat box and nobody had taken the time to clean it up. Gross!
StudentDebtSurvivor Oh my gosh that’s the worst! It’s probably better than them hiding the smell, though, which happened to a friend of mine recently.