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Buyer's buy homes based on emotion - how a home "feels" to them.  Many factors come into play, many that the buyer isn't even aware of.  Buyer's buy what they see.  Ask your friends and neighbors to view your home through "buyer's eyes" and give you their honest opinions.  In general; cleaner is better, brighter and more open is better, no odors is better, and neutral colors are best.  Make your home as appealing and uncluttered as the home you would like to buy.

OUTSIDE

Good "curb appeal" is imperative.  If people don't like your house from the outside, they won't want to come inside.

1.   Make sure the front lawn looks neat and tidy to make the first impression favorable.  Cut the grass and trim the hedges and shrubs.

2.   Plant some extra flowers for color - or just puts some pots beside the front door.

3.   Spruce up your landscaping with some fresh plantings.  Even a few items can improve the look of things.

4.   Remove all dead limbs and debris.  Give the yard a fresh raking and the sidewalk and driveway a good sweeping.

5.   Walk your fence line.  Repair, patch, or paint any problem areas.

6.   Put away lawn equipment.  Arrange outdoor items, such as firewood or outdoor furniture neatly.

7.   Take a close look at your front door.  It's a focal point and one of the first things your prospects will examine.  If it's faded or shows signs of needing repairs, clean it, stain it, or paint it.  While your at it do the same with the back door and garage door too.

8.   Repainting the entire exterior of your home is a fairly expensive venture, and really unnecessary unless the walls have bad blistering or peeling paint.  But, you can do wonders by simply painting window sashes, trim, and shutters.

9.   Replace faded house numbers with shiny new brass ones.

10. If needed, replace or repaint the mailbox.

11. Check the roof for shingles or flashing that need replacing.

12. Fix any broken windows or screens, and wash them for a bright, sparkling appearance.

13. Test the entry light and the doorbell.  It's the little things that matter.

14. Haul off any junk in your side or back yard.

15. Clean out the garage.  The perfect garage contains only cars - do your best.

INSIDE

After you've tackled the exterior of your home, head inside.  The goal here is to make everything look more spacious, more organized, brighter, warm, and homey.

1.   No matter what the season, do your spring cleaning.  Clean houses sell a lot easier than dirty ones.

2.   About the cheepest way to make rooms seem warmer and brighter is by buying higher intensity light bulbs, putting them in every lamp in the house, and then turning them on.  Also, always open drapes and angle blinds to brighten rooms.  This gives the house a friendly glow.  Buyers will react positively, and feel good about your home.

3.   Brighten things with  fresh paint.  White, off white, or beige walls make a room look bigger and lighter.  And you can be fairly certain these colors will go with the new buyer's furnishings.  Painting the inside costs very little, gives a "new" smell, and makes a big difference in buyer perception, so go ahead and do it.

4.   Clear off the kitchen counters - that includes small appliances and dish-draining racks.  Make the counters look as expansive as possible.

5.   Too much furniture can make a home "feel wrong".  So move out all your excess furniture, especially worn or outdated furniture, to make rooms seem larger and uncluttered, and take down pictures that hide walls.

6.   Clean out all your closets to make them look bigger.  Store out-of-season clothes in the attic, and get rid of excess items.  Neatly arrange everything thats left.

7.   Have a huge garage sale with all your excess items.  Not only will you be reducing clutter, but you can use the money you earn to finance your touch-ups.  You will also be reducing your moving costs.

8.   Clean all your windows and mirrors so they sparkle.

9.   Arrange the furniture so each room feels as spacious as possible.

10. If the carpeting looks dirty, have it cleaned.  If it looks worn, or is a loud color, consider replacing it.  You will probably recover the cost, and your home will sell faster.  Ask Jim & Robyn Nuth about the competition in your market to help you decide.

11. Launder draperies and curtains, if needed.  Dust blinds and furniture.

12. Clean out the inside of kitchen cabinets.  Leave them looking clean and spacious.

13. Clean the oven and all appliances.  Wash the grease splatters from around the stove.  Don't forget to polish the chrome on the sink.  Clean out the refrigerator, use a clear wax and polish the floors.

14. A grungy bathroom will kill sales.  Make each bath look like a guest bath.  Polish the tub, toilet, and bathroom sink.  Clean all tile, grout, and caulk.  Replace cracked tiles, and regrout if necessary.

15. Put out fresh towels and a new bar of matching colored soap when the house is to be shown.

16. Get out your tool kit, and fix all those little things that you've lived with over the months or years.

17. Tighten loose doorknobs, drawers, cabinet handles, towel racks, switch plates, and outlet covers.

18. Tack down any loose molding, glue down any lifted wallpaper, replace any cracked switch plates.

19. Fix sticking doors and windows.

20. Fix leaky faucets and remove water stains.

21. If it's time to spray or bomb for bugs, don't wait until the last minute.

WHEN YOUR HOME IS SHOWN

When it's time for Jim & Robyn Nuth, or another agent, to show your home, all your preparations will be worth it.  But there are a few final tips that can add that little extra magic.

1.   Before prospective buyers walk in the door, give you home the welcoming aroma of fresh baked bread or cinnamon rolls.  (A pot of cinnamon and water on the stove will give the same reesults.)  Do not smoke in the house.

2.   Clear out the kids, their toys, the cat, and the dog.

3.   Turn off the television, stereo, and radio.  Like kids and animals, they too can be distracting.

4.   Turn on all your lights - open all the drapes and blinds - even during daylight.

5.   Put out fresh flowers, your best towels, and a nice tablecloth.

6.   Make yourself scarce.  Many prospects feel like intruders when the owners are present.  They tend to hurry away, or fail to ask the questions they'd like to ask.  Your absence will put buyers at ease, and give them a chance to spend more time looking at your house, absorbing its advantages and visualizing themselves living there.

7.   Be polite, but avoid conversations with prospects.  Their agents need their complete attention to increase their interest in your home.

8.   Don't appologize for the appearance or condition of your home.  You'll only call attention to things the buyer might have overlooked.

9.   Don't try to complicate the sale of the home by discussing drapes, furniture, appliances, etc.  If the buyer wants any of these items, the agent can ask about them later.

10. Keep your home on the market.  Let your home be shown even when your not there.  If you don't, your limiting the showings - and actually keeping your house off the market many hours a day.

11. Always keep your home ready to be shown.  Jim & Robyn Nuth and other agents will try to give you as much advance warning as possible, but be prepared.

3. Are you available to prospect on a full time basis until the house is sold?

            Most homeowners work at another profession and find it impossible to show the home except on weekends or after dark.  Many buyers can’t or won’t have the patience to wait to see the home – they are too afraid someone else will come in and write a contract.  They want to look at homes they can view and write contracts on without waiting.

            And where does the homeowner obtain potential buyers?  Can you prospect for homebuyers during the day?  If you are going to sell your home, you will need to.  Less than 50% of buyers use the newspaper to buy a home – how can you be sure they saw your add?  Over 82% of buyers use a Realtor.  Can you network with real estate agents to find a buyer for your home?  You will have to cold call every Realtor in your area to tell them about your home, 

a time consuming task unless you are an agent or have the home listed.  That is the purpose of the MLS – it is the Realtor’s message board on what homes are for sale.

            Can you leave work to show your home to a potential buyer?  Are you available to stop what you are doing to take calls about your property?  Will your boss understand that you have another full-time job – selling your home?  If the answer to those questions is no, you need an agent who does work full-time on your behalf to market your home and bring it to a closing.

            How often do you want to hold an open house?  Depending on your marketing strategies you’ll need to do it often, 39% of homebuyers attend open houses.          

            You will want to put a sign in the front yard, 38% of buyers look at homes with yard signs.

            And what about online services?  Few online companies carry for sale by owner listings – but more than 18% of homebuyers look for homes on the Internet, and that number rises daily.  Where do they go?  Where they can look at an abundance of homes – Realtor.com, Westusa.com, azrealtorpros4u.com, and other sites with hundreds of thousands of listings plus search criteria to make finding a home easy.  Do you have that at your disposal?

4. Can you answer objections and criticism without getting emotionally involved and upset?

            The chances for finding a buyer with the same tastes and appreciation for your home as you have are slim to none.  You can bet that the first words out of the buyer’s mouth are what they would change if the house were theirs.  That wood paneling in the den that you think is so handsome may strike a Gen-X homebuyer as dark and outdated-looking.  Flooring, paint colors and decorative accents you have chosen may provoke titters.  Your dog is your best friend, but can you be objective about the way the carpet may smell because of his accidents, fur, and muddy paws?  And willing to do something about it?  What about those numerous small repairs you always meant to do?  The buyer will find the cabinet door that sticks, the rattling lock, the missing window screen and the broken tile in the bathroom quicker than you can say Jack Rabbit.

            And the buyer will draw every one of these items to your attention; criticizing and discounting the home you love before your very eyes.  Can you keep smiling?

            The Realtor can absorb a lot of the electrical charge between the buyer and a seller.  The seller will always see his/her home in its most favorable, and even unrealistic, light.  A buyer typically will judge flaws more harshly than a seller, leaving plenty of room for a gap to widen in negotiations.  The seller wants the most money for the home, and the buyer wants the most home for the money. A Realtor can get the two to meet in the middle.

5. Can you call a prospect back without placing yourself in a poor bargaining position?

            Do you know what to say, what not to say, and what questions to ask?  How do you know this is a qualified buyer and not someone who simply wants to gain entry to your home?  How much should you reveal?  Do you know how to qualify a buyer?  How to negotiate?

6. Are you familiar with all the financing possibilities to guarantee the sale?  Do you have the sources of financing?

            In a perfect world, the buyer will come to the table with cash in hand for the house.  But the reality is that the buyer will require some kind of financing.  Do you know where to send them?  What kind of credit do they have?  Can they afford the home?  How can you prevent tying up your home in a contract with someone who can’t afford the home, wasting precious marketing time, and perhaps losing the interest of other more qualified buyers?

7. Do you really have the time to handle all the details?

            The seller must handle repairs, the presentation of the home, paperwork, negotiations, other interested buyers, plus shopping for a new home and moving preparations all at the same time.

            Selling a home involves a great deal of preparation and evaluation and that is just to arrive at a marketing plan.  Sometimes this can involve making repairs on the home, staging the home, preparing for an open house, and even choosing the right moment to place the home on the market.  Then you must handle advertising to attract the buyer. What works – what doesn’t work?

            The seller must become expert in real estate contracts and their legal responsibilities.  Do you know your liabilities?  Are you familiar with disclosure?  Are you confident that you know enough about the real estate transaction to follow through without professional advise?

            Then when a buyer is interested, the seller may have to show the home multiple times before a contract is signed.  In the meanwhile, numerous discussions will ensue which change the negotiations constantly.  Do you know how to move a sale along when it is stalled in negotiations?  Do you know when to walk away?

            Since the buyer and seller are presumably saving money on a Realtor’s commission, the seller will have to perform the Realtor’s job and provide the services a Realtor would provide for both the buyer and seller.  Is that what you want to do?

            It’s tougher than you think to do it yourself!  In addition, an industry survey states that houses sold by agents bring an average of 9½% more than similar owner sold homes, more than paying for the commission and with a little left over.  Owners who use an agent net more money, more time and more piece of mind.

Think about it!

            If there is anything we can do for you, answer questions, offer a free market survey, or help save you time, money, and energy in selling your home, please call Jim and Robyn Nuth with West USA Realty at our office 602-375-3300, or our direct line at 602-525-3224