Get your home SOLD!

The days of sticking a sign in the ground and waiting for the contracts to pour in the front door are very much over.

I am always amazed (given the amount of information on the Internet) how many sellers do not understand the concept of displaying their home as an item to be SOLD. Sellers preparing to post an item on EBay will take the time to package their products in the best light possible, knowing quite well that they are competing with sometimes millions of similar offerings. Many sellers do not take this approach toward selling their homes, at a very dear cost in the final outcome.

Let’s look at three major reasons why home sellers do not take the time to prepare their home as well as they should to compete in this market.

First, there is that personal, subjective view that the home owner’s improvements will appeal to buyers today. I mean, who would not love the orange carpeting and dark paneling that we lovingly installed in the family room 30 years ago?

Then there is the seller’s need to live in the home while it is being sold. Sellers continue to personalize the home with their stacks of LPs and laundry that they fail to see in the corner of the living room, or the baby’s toys strewn across the kitchen floor or the stack of dishes piled in the sink. All of these are distractions to a buyer.

Finally, there is the cost and lack of motivation to spend money to fix up something the seller sees as perfectly fine. The avocado green refrigerator is in perfect working shape and matches the avocado stove and dishwasher. What’s wrong with the flocked wallpaper in the foyer?

If you are a seller (or about to be one), I challenge you to move your mindset from one of “I am selling my HOME” to “I have my HOUSE to sell”. This is the hardest (and the most necessary) concept you must embrace well before the ink is dried on the listing agreement.

OK, now you are committed to move and you want to sell your HOUSE. What are the best practices that will guarantee an easy sale? How do I get those good buyers to choose MY house over the one down the street? Follow this blog in the next few weeks and I’ll show you how.