Preparing your home for a sale can be a stressful situation. Between working through clerical work with a real estate agent and making everything is in order for your future, there’s plenty that can get lost in the mix.
To help you stay on track, here are tips and suggestions to prepare your house for a sale, as well as how you can attract buyers by decluttering your home of personal items.
How to Prepare To Sell Your House
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Start with the paperwork
Before you do any work on your home to prep for the sale, you’re gonna make sure you dot your I’s and cross your T’s, so to speak. Long story short, you’ll need to decide whether you would like to list and price your home on your own, or work with a real estate agent.
This is important because you’ll already be doing a lot of the decluttering to prepare on your own, so you’ll need to decide if you have the bandwidth to handle the sale itself or not, too.
Working with a real estate agent will allow you more time to focus on everything you need to do to get your home ready, from house cleanouts for the sale to decluttering projects, you’ll need all the time you get.
Documents needed to sell a house
From sales contracts to inspection reports to purchase offers, deeds and more, here are the typical documents needed to sell a house.
- Utility bills
- Tax bills
- Mortgage loan documents (if you have one)
- Disclosure documents
- Personal identification
- Final purchase and sale agreement
How to improve curb appeal
The No. 1 thing to consider when getting a home ready to sell is to consider curb appeal.
So what is curb appeal? By definition, curb appeal deals with how attractive your property is to potential buyers. So when you’re ready to start the steps to prepare to sell your house, curb appeal should be at top of your mind.
So the question remains: How to add curb appeal to a home? The process isn’t as confusing as you may think. Most home decluttering projects are typically for a person to clean up their space for healthier living.
It depends on the property, but sometimes clearing out yard debris and clearing the drive way will take you most of the way. But with a home sale, you’re going to want to go above and beyond. Because after all, you’re not decluttering for yourself, you’re decluttering to make some money 🤑.
Related Article: Check out these tips to boost curb appeal and increase your home’s value.
Start with exterior home maintenance
The first thing a prospective buyer will see is the outside of your home. You don’t necessarily need to begin the home prep for sale with this, but you definitely want to make sure this is the focal point, and that you spend the most time and energy on improving your home’s exterior.
With exterior maintenance, the focus, at first, should be on the front porch. Improving your front porch curb appeal is usually the first step. The front yard is essentially the first overall impression of the home. You’ll want to focus on your landscape choices, as planting the right greenery can help you spruce up your exterior.
Easy ways to improve curb appeal
- Power wash the driveway
- Re-paint your home’s exterior
- Replace or renovate garage doors
- Replace or renovate any windows or window boxes.
After you’ve checked every corner of the outside of your home, you’re ready to dive inside. For everything inside your home, you’re going to need a plan.
Related Article: How to organize and declutter your garage like a professional.
We suggest, you guessed it, a checklist!
Make a checklist to declutter your home
You may be sensing a bit of a theme with the checklists, but, they are important! Starting room by room helps you stick to a schedule, which is important if you’re on a time constraint.
Which room you choose to start organizing and decluttering first is totally up to you. However, since you are decluttering for a sale, you may want to focus on areas of the house that a prospective buyer may spend the most time in.
You’ll want to consider how you show the house. We suggest you start and spend the most time in the living room. After all, a living room should be inviting, right? Here’s a quick rundown of a few things you can do to help you get started.
11 tips to declutter your home and organize to prep for a sale
- Clear the hallways.
- Clear out your kitchen junk drawer.
- Toss out, sell or donate excess furniture.
- Clear kitchen counters of any appliances.
- Keep the living room table decor to a minimum.
- Update lighting fixtures that are old or outdated.
- Organize any storage rooms in the basement or attic.
- Declutter any kids toys and games that may be left out
- Check bathroom drawers and cabinets and get rid of personal items.
- Go through wardrobes and throw out old clothing you aren’t taking with you.
- Make minor home repairs as needed like leaks, or even replace old water heaters.
The ultimate goal is to make your home look attractive without all the everyday life qualities you may see from a working household.
Decluttering for a sale should make your home look almost too good to be true!
De-Personalize your Home! When preparing your home for a sale, the # one way to appeal to buyers is to take the personal aspect out of the home. Just because you like the wall decor doesn’t mean a prospective buyer will. Make a buyer feel like they can see themselves in this home.
Hire help to prepare your house for a sale
Between all that goes into prepare to before selling your home, whether you hire a real estate agent or not, and the decluttering projects, sometimes the work can be rather overwhelming.
Having trouble with decluttering on your own? LoadUp is a trusted, on-demand junk removal service capable of hauling items like a mattress or refrigerator, or even bagged or boxed junk.
Need your whole property cleaned out? LoadUp can do that, too, and for a guaranteed upfront price that’s often up to 30% less than the market average.
In the end, decluttering to help prepare for a sale needs to be done properly in order to maximize your earnings potential on your sale. So don’t be afraid to let the professionals help if you can’t get it done on your own.
Looking for a property cleanout? LEARN MORE ❯
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