This past summer my husband and I sold our home and got a full asking price offer! I wanted to share with you my 8 tips on how to sell your home quickly.
So, how did we sell our house so quickly? I believe there were three main reasons:
- It showed well. Matt and I worked really hard to clean and repair the house. We kept running checklists of every little detail that needed attention and worked on it for months.
- Timing. We knew we wanted to sell the house during peak season, which is spring. This is when people are looking to move before the next school season starts.
- Pricing. We priced just under what the comps said our home was worth. This way we could bring in buyers from a certain price bracket.
Pro tip: Research the market before you talk to your realtor.
Get a good realtor! Research realtors in your area or ask friends who they’ve used in the past. There is a difference between a buyer’s agent and a seller’s agent, so make sure to interview more than one and see who you are most comfortable working with.
With that being said, we sold with a flat rate MLS realtor and saved almost 3% of our purchase price! And we would do it again in a heartbeat. If you’re looking to save thousands of dollars and are willing to put in the work and research the market, you can do it too.
A flat rate MLS realtor is as good as the agent you have working for you. And in many cases, these agents are capable and diligent and the only difference you will find in service is the fee structure. You need to carefully evaluate the agent’s complete program to see whether it will work for you.
We suggest hiring a local flat rate agent rather than a larger company. These larger companies general farm out the listings to the local agents anyways. Plus the local agent is going to be more familiar with the market in your area and will make sure that your listing gets put up on your local MLS.
We had our house listed on the MLS through the realtor and then conducted all of the showings via the app that many realtors use to let us know that a showing was requested. We also created our home flyer and took all of the pictures ourselves.
8 Tips to Sell Your House Quickly
Clear The Clutter
Now is the time to get rid of all that stuff that seems to accumulate over the years. If you haven’t used, worn or needed the item in at least 1 year, ask yourself why you are keeping it? You want the rooms in your house to seem large with lots of space to the prospective buyer.
In order for the buyers to be able to see their stuff in your house, there needs to be space. Get some baskets and start sorting.
Have a garage sale, donate, throw away, or rent a storage unit to put some things until your ready to move. Plus, when you’re ready to move, packing will be a lot less stressful because you’ve already decluttered and cleaned out.
Repairs
Over the years in your house, there is wear and tear that takes place. Fix all those minor items which need to be repaired. Leaky faucets, clogged drains, squeaky or broken drawers are a no-go. Also, touch up any paint, re-caulk around fixtures and moldings and make any small repairs.
We want the potential buyers to remember that the house is clean and kept up. My tip is to grab a pen and paper and walk around the house making a list of all the small repairs that haven’t been completed.
A well-maintained and well-cared for
home will sell faster than others.
Neutralize and De-Personalize
If there are really bold paint colors and decor in your house, consider changing it out for something more neutral. White, gray or greige are great colors to choose from.
Along the same lines, I recommend taking down all the family photos. Which I didn’t want up anyways for people to look at.
Any pet bowls, beds and crates should be put away or cleaned really well if left out.
Also, baby gear and kids toys should be neatly put away or placed in the basement before a showing. Some buyers may find it difficult to look around all the kid clutter (if they don’t have any kids) and envision their belongings in the house.
You want to create a welcoming space that the buyer can see themselves living in.
The more neutral your house, the easier it is for buyers to see themselves living there.
Whole House Deep Clean
This tip is crucial and really important. It sets you up for the next step of staging your home and taking pictures.
This will probably take a full weekend, but it’s totally worth it. Line up some babysitters if you need to or enlist some extra help from friends and family.
Like I said before, buyers notice even the small details that seem unimportant to you and they make a big difference. At the very least, buyers with leave and in the back of their minds, they will remember that your house was clean.
Stage Your House
After you have decluttered, fixed anything that needed to be fixed, neutralized and cleaned the house we want to stage it. Each room should have one purpose.
For example, the guest room shouldn’t have workout gear, a bed, desk, and a bookshelf all stuffed in there.
Give the buyers a destination for their belongings or inspire them with what the room could be when they buy it!
My recommendation is to empty out the room your working on except for large furniture and then start adding in your decor items until you get it to look the way you want.
Great Listing Photos
These days people are used to seeing really nice pictures of homes online and you want your house to stand out from the rest. So, make sure your realtor is taking good pictures.
Here are a couple of other options to consider:
- Hire a professional photographer to come and take pictures of your house.
- Ask a friend who has a nice camera if they could come and take some pictures for you and help you edit them. Don’t forget to write a thank you note!
When we sold our house I took all of our pictures and used Lightroom to edit them and make them brighter. But I really enjoy taking photos and editing, so that made the process easy.
Take your photos on a cloudy day where there is still lots of daylight but the sun won’t cast any harsh rays across your pictures. The brighter the better!
Also, the pictures that get put up on your listing are what the buyers are going to expect to see when they come to see your house, so it’s important that you try to keep it looking that way. Which can be difficult, believe me, I know. I did it with two little girls following me around!
Curb Appeal
A lot of buyers will drive-by the house before they even ask to see inside. This is what we do when we are looking at houses, so I figured others would do it to our house. It is a great way to get a feel of the neighborhood.
Having the garden beds cleaned out and mulched, weeds pulled, grass mowed and some flowers out, help your house look well maintained. Which will then make the buyers want to see the inside of your house.
Set the right price.
This might be the last tip I have, but it is crucial to getting your home to sell quickly. Now if you have a realtor they should help you set a good price for your home.
Here’s the difficult thing, you need to separate yourself emotionally from your house at this point. It is a business transaction and regardless of what you feel your home might be worth, there must be the comparables to justify that price.
You need to find 3-5 similar homes in your area that support your price. Start with a 1-2 mile radius from your home and sold within 90 days. If unable to get 3-5 comps within that time frame, you can move out 3-6+ months. These homes need to have similar square footage, beds, and bathrooms as your home. You can view previously sold homes on Zillow.
Also, consider the price bracket you’re listing in. For example, if I list a house at $405,500 because I feel that is what it is worth then someone who has a search set for anything under $400,000 is not going to see my house. Listing at $399,900 might have been a better option and it may get bid up to $405,500 or higher, which is also great.
Don’t be afraid to list your house a little under what you think the home is worth. You might be pleasantly surprised and get multiple offers and get asking price or over.
I hope that these tips on how to sell your house quickly were helpful! I know that when we were planning on selling our house I didn’t want it to sit on the market for a long time. We preferred to do the work up front to help it sell quickly, rather than sit there and wonder why our house wasn’t selling.
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