By Cassie Steele
A Clean Home Sells Faster
The average home is seen 8-10 times (study by Sage Real Estate) before it sells. This means that you need to make sure that your house is clean and decluttered in order to make the viewings easier. It will also make life easier if you have a home inspection. When you are displaying your house, a potential buyer needs to imagine themselves living there. The best way to help them, is to store your personal nick-nacks, give the rooms a fresh coat of neutral colored paint and give your home a thorough deep clean.
Smell is as important as sight
How your house smells is just as important as how it looks. Imagine walking into a property, and as soon as you have opened the door and you are hit with the stench of stale cigarettes? Would you buy it? Don’t forget that smells can seep into everything, including the fabrics of your sofa and bedding, and the curtains. Before you invite viewers to your home, invest in a steam cleaner and give all the material items on show a thorough clean. You should also make sure that you have clean bed covers for all the beds in the house, even if they’re not regularly used. Potential buyers need to imagine themselves sleeping and being contented in the house.
Outside is just as important as inside
The house itself might be the most important thing that you are selling, but the outside – your front drive and garden is the first thing that a potential buyer will see. You don’t need to be green fingered to make a yard presentable – you just need to make it clean and tidy. Use a pressure washer to clean your patio areas and garden furniture. This is especially important after the winter, when these details might be neglected. Mow the lawn and make sure any garden pots have seasonal flowers in them.
Pay attention to the details
When you are cleaning your home ready for viewing, attention to detail is extremely important. For instance, in a normal household cleaning routine, you wouldn’t consider cleaning round the light and plug switches, or looking for cobwebs on the ceilings, but these are the sort of details that buyers look for when they are viewing a house. They generally have a very critical eye, and even the little details can put them off a purchase. Remember, you are trying to sell as blank a canvas as possible.
A clean home is more desirable for potential buyers. A house that is decluttered and immaculately presented is likely to sell faster, meaning that you could be moving much sooner.
Resources:
19 Things Nobody Tells You About Selling Your Home – Get What You Want
www.getwhatyouwant.ca/19-
Seller Home Inspections – Begin Inspections
www.begininspections.com/
3 Factors to Consider when buying a carpet cleaner – Yellow Pages
www.yellowpages.ca/tips/3-
Best Pressure Washer Reviews – Yard Care Gurus – www.yardcaregurus.com/best-
How to clean your bathroom in just 10 minutes printable checklist – Just Bee Blog
www.justbeeblog.com/clean-