If you are preparing a house for sale, it might be necessary to spend some money on it, if you want to sell the house without delay and at your desired price. Beyond basic decluttering and cleaning, there are areas where some money may need to be spent. You might not need to spend money on every area, but some cash directed to certain spots will help sell your property.
Although it's obvious, this is a good beginning. From top to bottom, simply give the house a good cleaning. Make clutter disappear. Things you haven't used in several months can be discarded. Wash ceilings, walls, woodwork, windows, and floors. Clean grout in your tiled floors, walls, and countertops. Steam clean carpeting, and launder throw rugs or replace them with new colors. Repair anything that is broken. Fix or replace worn or broken window shades or blinds, patch or replace screens in windows, replace cracked or broken windows, replace broken light fixtures, patch holes or cracks.
Any unfinished repair work that you have left should be done. Those issues will be found by the buyer's home inspector anyway, and if there are obvious repairs that need to be made, you are hindering offers. Unfinished repairs or projects reflect badly on the overall maintenance of the home and send up a red flag to would-be buyers. Nothing will make a buyer pull out of a deal and run for the hills faster than a home inspection report riddled with needed repairs and safety concerns.
Be sure to paint. And start with the ceilings. More time than you would think is spent staring at ceilings. Signs of a leaky roof are what they are looking for, but they don't want to see grease or smoke stains and ceiling cracks either. New paint is the most cost effective improvement, and nothing else says freshness like it does. On large cracks, use fiberglass tape and cover it with joint compound and sand. A good neutral color for paint is a light tan.
Old or stained carpet could be replaced before it goes up for sale. To get it ready to show, a professional cleaning is often good enough, but it might not always be. Stained or dated carpet is a huge turnoff to potential buyers, especially if you have pets. No one is interested in purchasing a house with carpet stained by other peoples' pets, even if they are pet lovers themselves.
The light available in your home should be maximized. Every buyer cites good light as the one thing that that they want in a home, after location. Clean the windows, change the lampshades, take down the drapes, increase the wattage of your light bulbs and cut the bushes outside to let in sunshine. Do what you have to do make your house bright and cheery - it will make it more sellable.
Fixing up your home can be painless and inexpensive, if you do it yourself and use some creative planning and ideas. This advice should give you a good beginning.
Although it's obvious, this is a good beginning. From top to bottom, simply give the house a good cleaning. Make clutter disappear. Things you haven't used in several months can be discarded. Wash ceilings, walls, woodwork, windows, and floors. Clean grout in your tiled floors, walls, and countertops. Steam clean carpeting, and launder throw rugs or replace them with new colors. Repair anything that is broken. Fix or replace worn or broken window shades or blinds, patch or replace screens in windows, replace cracked or broken windows, replace broken light fixtures, patch holes or cracks.
Any unfinished repair work that you have left should be done. Those issues will be found by the buyer's home inspector anyway, and if there are obvious repairs that need to be made, you are hindering offers. Unfinished repairs or projects reflect badly on the overall maintenance of the home and send up a red flag to would-be buyers. Nothing will make a buyer pull out of a deal and run for the hills faster than a home inspection report riddled with needed repairs and safety concerns.
Be sure to paint. And start with the ceilings. More time than you would think is spent staring at ceilings. Signs of a leaky roof are what they are looking for, but they don't want to see grease or smoke stains and ceiling cracks either. New paint is the most cost effective improvement, and nothing else says freshness like it does. On large cracks, use fiberglass tape and cover it with joint compound and sand. A good neutral color for paint is a light tan.
Old or stained carpet could be replaced before it goes up for sale. To get it ready to show, a professional cleaning is often good enough, but it might not always be. Stained or dated carpet is a huge turnoff to potential buyers, especially if you have pets. No one is interested in purchasing a house with carpet stained by other peoples' pets, even if they are pet lovers themselves.
The light available in your home should be maximized. Every buyer cites good light as the one thing that that they want in a home, after location. Clean the windows, change the lampshades, take down the drapes, increase the wattage of your light bulbs and cut the bushes outside to let in sunshine. Do what you have to do make your house bright and cheery - it will make it more sellable.
Fixing up your home can be painless and inexpensive, if you do it yourself and use some creative planning and ideas. This advice should give you a good beginning.
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