# Big Bang Theory-selling a home



## fifi (Apr 3, 2009)

In your experience and/or readings, what do you think earns you the biggest bang for your buck in preparing a home to sell? If you have a couple/few things that you think increase the value the most relative to cost (in terms of time and/or money!), I'd love to hear your thoughts. 

I have done some reading on websites, and obviously a non-offensive paint job's a big one; what's next on your list (or is something else first for you?)


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## the-royal-mail (Dec 11, 2009)

The BIGGEST thing is cleanliness. When I was down east and looking for a condo I can't tell you the number of places I walked away from account the way some of those people were living. I realize you may still be living there but gosh, clean up the bathroom, empty your dryer lint (one place had so much it was bulging out), throw away your pizza boxes, clean the sink etc. Too many places were turned down by me not because they were bad places but because of how disgusting they looked as described above.

The most memorable place I saw (which I didn't buy because of barking dogs in the unit across the hall) looked like a catalog piece, no word of a lie, that place was OUTSTANDING. I think the people were living there but you would never know it. Everything was spotless, beautiful furniture, well-designed interior. It seriously looked like something you would see in pictures or on TV. I felt bad not buying it but those barking dogs did them in as far as my dollar was concerned.

If you're going to sell, keep your house/property clean.


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## Berubeland (Sep 6, 2009)

I agree with Royal. 

The other thing you might want to do is to have your most honest friend over to ask how your place smells. 

Generally we can't smell our own place, only others can, but a lot of smells are actually subliminal for us. You want it to smell good

You'll need to pay attention that the entire place looks ok from the street on. Trim bushes, buy a few planters, paint the porch, nothing expensive just welcoming.


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## hystat (Jun 18, 2010)

rent a storage locker and put 1/2 of your possessions in it

send pets to live with a friend or relative 

ditto on clean and fresh paint.....
pressure washing the exterior of a house goes a long way too
and if anyone is thinking "but the outside of my house isn't dirty"... you'll only notice after.

painting a driveway black with that sealer (but not the day before an open house  )


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## Jungle (Feb 17, 2010)

Removing clutter, family pictures on the wall, tooth brush in the bathroom, etc. Leave everything open looking.


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## Berubeland (Sep 6, 2009)

Wow Fifi, looks like you got some work ahead of you


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## Scottlandlord (May 27, 2010)

Berubeland said:


> Generally we can't smell our own place,


Are you trying to tell us something? I'll send you an air freshener.

I've sold many places over the years, many privately. Little touch-ups can be slightly helpful.

However, if you are looking for *significant* price increases you need to make your property attractive to a customer that will have certain requirements for that new price range.

I suggest investing in landscaping, garage and front doors, kitchens, bathrooms and overhead lighting in the dining and family rooms.

With capital investments of 10-20k, I've made significant profits over pre-improvement appraisals. In many ways, selling a home is like selling a dream or a life-style. This is one of the reasons why I hire professionals to do the work, as I want thinks looking premium.

PM me if you want some details about some of details of things I did.


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## Four Pillars (Apr 5, 2009)

I agree with the other posters - great suggestions.

One other thing is to try to fix things that are broken or in really bad shape. You don't have to make them perfect, but at least try for improvement.

The other thing is to try to prioritize the areas that the viewers will see first. Front of the house, first floor etc.


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

I'm planning to sell in the spring so I've been investing a bit of time/money this year

Some lawn care, driveway seal and pressure washing went a long way for the curb apeal. The driveway was dull and oil stained, the house was dullish white, and the lawn was thin and yellowish. Now it's all bright and new I can't believe the difference a few hundred made

I never painted the house but I'm debating the cost, it would certainly be more than I spent outside. I don't think it's worth paying someone and I'm not sure it's worth my time

I'm considering paying a cleaner and gardener while it's for sale but I'm not sure that's worth it either. I keep things reasonably clean but I would have trouble keeping things pristine


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## fifi (Apr 3, 2009)

Great suggestions so far; having a couple kids, I'm not sure how I'm going to keep the clutter down, but realize that's an important one. We're in the middle of painting, and I like some of the thoughts so far; thanks!!!


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## kcowan (Jul 1, 2010)

You definitely want to leave the impression that nobody lives there. Whether it is sights or smells, pictures, magazines - all evidence of your personalization should be gone during a showing. All clutter is the storage facility.


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## Scottlandlord (May 27, 2010)

You'd be amazed at the offers if you truly upgrade your house. You will attract people from outside your normal buyers market.

It's also a good idea to contact Realtors from an area that is higher priced than yours.

PM for details. I can't emphasize these points enough. Local Realtors might think your 400k figure is crazy...while Realtors from another region might view it as a steal.

Keep positive.


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## GeniusBoy27 (Jun 11, 2010)

I say keep it looking simple, clean, and decluttered.

When I sold in Boston, I moved my fiancee's (now my wife's) stuff back home first. Having half the stuff in the space, made it look much bigger.

Make it feel like someone's home, and you'll be surprised how quickly it sells (mine sold in 2 days -- namely because I was away.)

My best friend sold his condo in Toronto, and his place was a pig sty. The first thing they did was moved the junk into a storage locker. Then they cleaned, scrubbed and made it brand spanking new. Decluttering the place, and he sold for 20% above his asking price.


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## Addy (Mar 12, 2010)

For those who have moved stuff to a storage unit, did you move it yourself? I will be moving un-necessary furniture and other smaller stuff to a storage unit, but I can't move the larger furniture myself. In your opinion, is it worth it to hire movers to move the stuff from (and then back to) your house for the time it's up for sale?


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

Addy said:


> In your opinion, is it worth it to hire movers to move the stuff from (and then back to) your house for the time it's up for sale?


One way around that is to sell your house after moving to the new house/accomodation.
That way all your personal stuff is already gone and you can design the old house purely for selling i.e. no personal effects, etc.


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## Jungle (Feb 17, 2010)

No, find a friend or family member, that will help for a case of beer. 

I don't trust movers after reading 3 years of horror stories on RFD. The company at issue, Dezi Movers (sp?), runs many sub companies, all scams under one ring leader. Anyway, many were arrested by Toronto Police, after three years of complaints and scams. They are fraudulent and will withhold your stuff, for more money.


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## iherald (Apr 18, 2009)

One thing to think about if you do move a lot of stuff into storage is do you need that stuff? We all tend to buy and have it there, but a move allows you to actually think about if you use it. If you don't use it, don't store it or move it, sell it.


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## kcowan (Jul 1, 2010)

The storage places rely on people that cannot make decisions. Most of the stuff they store is not accessed year in and year out but just racks up monthly fees. Eventually, the heirs get to take the stuff out and have a massive estate sale.


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## stinsont (May 29, 2009)

One poster nailed it when they mentioned -smell-. I have a renter moving out and had to show the place to potential renters. The place stunk so bad we have to hire a professional cleaning service to come in. 

The renter had no idea what I was talking about when I talked to them about it...thankfully I have a deposit from them.

We ended up renting the place but a little girl that is moving in with her mother asked if the smell would be gone when they move in...embarassing.


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## Addy (Mar 12, 2010)

HaroldCrump said:


> One way around that is to sell your house after moving to the new house/accomodation.
> That way all your personal stuff is already gone and you can design the old house purely for selling i.e. no personal effects, etc.


Our new house will be at least 1500 km's from our old house  But if we were doing a local move, I agree that would be a good idea.

Plus our movers (paid for by my husbands work) will only p/u at one location, so we have little choice but to bring it back from storage to the house for move-time.

The poster who mentioned if we really need all this stuff - we don't really need it all; we are (temporarily) in a smaller house and we don't want to sell our quality furniture while we will need it for our next house. So yes, we can scale back but we couldn't reasonably get rid of the majority of what we would put in storage. We would only be doing this to stage the house, and my word you would NOT want to live in a house that was staged... especially if you have small children!!


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## Rat Racer (Sep 16, 2010)

I agree with pretty much everything everyone is saying here. My experience is that best thing you can do it is make it seem like the place your target market would want to live. As mentioned, get rid of clutter, which can be tough to do, as you have an attachment to all the "nick nacks" in your place, but someone else can automatically get the relevance, get rid of it. We stored 2 pick up truck loads of stuff at my parents place. 
My wife who was on MAT leave at the time, went to stay out of town, so it looked clean and there was no one there to mess things up.
Having someone (in our case, our agent) give you an honest opinion of what to move out and what to keep is important.

Our house sold in 4 hour of putting the for sale sign up. I never thought it happen that fast, we never even made it to the open house. I something think to myself we should have asked for more.


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## Pigzfly (Dec 2, 2010)

Probably way too late, but I worked in the industry for a little bit and here are my two cents:

- Smells are important, but don't make any cover ups over-the-top.
- As a side note to the smells, bribing viewers with the smell and taste of cookies can work very well, even if it's just pillsbury.
- Rent a steam cleaner from a grocery store, if you can, and steam any carpets (especially if you have kids or pets).
- Take away your stuff, especially in storage areas (I know this is a pain, there's a reason it's storage!) ie shoes racks only half full. However, do not go overboard, depending on your target market. Some families will react to what looks like a sterile environment, as they cannot envision their children playing in pristine areas with nothing in them.
- Cleanliness is key. It does not necessarily scare everyone away like it did to the-royal-mail, but given the choice between one nasty, mangled hundred dollar bill and one nice crisp bill, which would you take? The cleaner of the two comparable houses will sell first.
- Word on the street is that buyers react favourably to yellow flowers; I don't get it, but hey.
- Turn on all the lights and open all blinds to make things brighter when showing.
- Test every single door/faucet/handle/light etc. People play with stuff.
- Ask a friend, who you trust and won't get mad at, who has a good eye for picking up broken/ugly things to do a walk through and write down their recommendations. It can be best if you do not go with them so they do not feel pressured about anything. You can become very good at forgetting that there is a missing plate on a light switch in the basement, etc. These details add up. 

- You said you had already dealt with curb appeal, which is huge. Trim back aggressively any plants/shrubs etc as well as the mentioned pressure washing. Consider painting just the trim of your house, after pressure washing the exterior. 
- If you leave town and have to leave your place for sale, have someone clean it periodically. Nothing like walking into a super dusty house with evaporated water toilet rings and a million real estate agent's cards sitting on the counter.

If you are looking to spend a few dollars, bathrooms are usually the way to go. (This may not result in a higher sales price, esp if you are paying trades to do things). It may be worthwhile to do a scan of sale prices on vanities/lights/dual flow toilets/granite countertops, etc at your local home improvement shops and/or a Habitat for Humanity ReStore. If you have a small ensuite etc, it may be possible to completely change the look of your master suite with some paint (bathroom and bedroom) and a new vanity and mirror (and possibly towels). 

Nice, plush looking towels are a good staging item. Ie if you have acne cream stained towels, hide those. If you have hooded kids towels in bright colours or with cartoon characters, hide them and display more adult-oriented towels. 

There are many more things, but those are my 2 cents for now. It completely depends upon the age of your home, your position in the market, your target buyer, etc, as to where your money is best spent.

OH - Another HUGE item which was a constant frustration to my partner and myself when we were looking - if you have sheds/locked off storage in a condo/anything which is blocked off (other than gun cabinets, etc!!!!), ensure that it is either open for the showing, or that the agent has a key. I wasn't interested in buying something that I couldn't see, especially when it was storage space of unknown size!


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## kcowan (Jul 1, 2010)

Also leave an open book where it looks like it is being read. Apparently this helps a potential buyer imagine living there. I am not sure if this also applies to a TV remote.


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

kcowan said:


> Also leave an open book where it looks like it is being read.


Just make sure the title of the book isn't _House Flipping for Dummies_ or _Idiot's Guide to Flipping Houses_


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## Four Pillars (Apr 5, 2009)

HaroldCrump said:


> Just make sure the title of the book isn't _House Flipping for Dummies_ or _Idiot's Guide to Flipping Houses_


Lol. Or _Home Structural Repair Made Easy_


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## kcowan (Jul 1, 2010)

Four Pillars said:


> Lol. Or _Home Structural Repair Made Easy_



Home staging for fun and profit!


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## fifi (Apr 3, 2009)

Thanks for the suggestions that everyone has offered--as we know, the market is pretty suppressed for sellers right now, between the time of the year and the general glut of homes on the market (certainly here in Calgary).

As tough as it is, we continue to keep the home as de-cluttered as possible, and have used some of the suggestions mentioned above.


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## K-133 (Apr 30, 2010)

fifi said:


> Great suggestions so far; having a couple kids, I'm not sure how I'm going to keep the clutter down, but realize that's an important one. We're in the middle of painting, and I like some of the thoughts so far; thanks!!!


My parents had 4 children and were addicted to buying and selling (I lived in 13 homes through my first 15 years of life).

They managed to get us to clean up after ourselves during those selling periods pretty well. 

Its possible - you just have to help your kids understand that it is important to do.


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## 412driver (Apr 30, 2010)

When you have an open house. Have a big pot of coffee brewing. That's an aroma everyone seems to like...


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## jamesbe (May 8, 2010)

My wife would leave the house vomiting if we walked into an open house with coffee brewing.


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## dogcom (May 23, 2009)

For me in Richmond BC the big bang theory is having your house banged down. They would probably send an inspector in and give me more money if my roof was falling down and my foundation was cracked.

Otherwise if your house is the value then all the above suggestions are good ideas.


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## Addy (Mar 12, 2010)

HaroldCrump said:


> One way around that is to sell your house after moving to the new house/accomodation.
> That way all your personal stuff is already gone and you can design the old house purely for selling i.e. no personal effects, etc.


If you did this I'm assuming you would have to qualify for both mortages?


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