Are You Ready to Sell Your Home?
Are You Ready to Sell Your Home?
“You never get a second chance to make a good first impression.” Little did you realize this sage advice from your parents was the key to selling your home quickly and getting top dollar in the process. As real estate professionals, we are often asked how to make a home sell quickly and easily. Our parents’ advice sums it up perfectly: you must make sure your home makes a good and lasting first impression.
How can you make sure your home makes a good first impression? First, you must get to work before you actually put your home on the market. You don’t want to “test the waters” first and then try to make a good impression as a fall back strategy. Your parents were right when they said you only get one chance!
You will never have more activity on the home than you will experience in the first three to four weeks after putting your home on the market. And, a home will typically sell at its highest price during those first few weeks. The reason is simple: there are buyers out there who have seen everything else on the market and are just waiting for something new to come along. And, it can get competitive.
Potential buyers want to be the first to see a new home listing before someone else beats them to it, just in case it’s “the one.” These buyers leap at every new house listing hoping to finally find the right home for their family. Real estate agents also watch closely for new listings, scheduling appointments as fast as possible for buyers who have yet to find their next home. To make sure your home looks good for all this activity, you will want to make sure your home is in top shape before you list it.
PUT Your Home Under the Microscope – When you’re getting your home ready for show, you will need to look past the floor plan to see what needs to be done. All human senses are working on overdrive when a prospective buyer walks into a home. Therefore, your home must not only look good to a potential buyer, it must appeal to other senses, smelling and feeling good as well. When they do find a house with a knockout punch to their senses, potential buyers are usually willing to buy quickly and for the highest price possible, often with complication-free transactions.
We Are In a Beauty Contest Right Now in Home Sales – Buyers want homes in good to excellent condition. Because today’s buyers are putting almost all their free cash into down payments and closing costs, they don’t often have a lot of cash left over for immediate home improvements. Rather than fix them immediately, buyers know they will probably have to live with outdated shag carpet, a broken gutter or 1960s wallpaper for a long time before their family budget will allow for improvements.
BUYERS Are Comparison Shopping – So, don’t forget you’re in competition with a lot of other houses on the market. When faced with a decision between two similarly-priced properties, buyers will almost always choose the property that is in the best condition. Only when two properties are in similar condition will the property that costs less hold the upper hand.
Why do some homes succeed at making a good first impression while other homes fail miserably? Well, many sellers are unable to look at their homes through the eyes of a potential buyer. Because we see defects in our homes day-in and day-out, we become immune to the effect these flaws have on the first-time visitor. So, when we prepare a house to sell, we must approach everything with the buyer in mind, staging the home for the best showing possible.
REMEMBER BUIDLER’S Model Homes? Builders’ model homes are a perfect example of how a property can be staged to emphasize a home’s positive attributes while downplaying the negative ones. Visitors to these homes are often impressed not only with the appearance of the home itself, but also with the furniture, artwork, and flower arrangements. Even the knick knacks on the shelves in a model home are chosen to help create a positive first impression. All this is done with the hopes that a buyer will want not only the house, but everything in it as well.
Luckily for the individual homeowner looking to sell their home, there are many things that can be done – without spending a lot of money – to give a house that “model home” look.
Follow us in our next post as we outline some actions that will help you get the most bang for your buck, and help you to sell your home quickly and easily. Good luck!
FREE MARKET ANALYSIS OF YOUR HOME – If you would like a free market analysis of your home, call or text Sally English,Atlanta real estate agent, at 404-229-2995. Sally English and The English Team are Atlanta Real Estate agents specializing in homes and neighborhoods convenient to Emory University, Centers for Disease Control and the VA Medical Center.
Looking to buy an Atlanta Home? Sally English and The English Team are experts who have great advice for Atlanta home buyers.