The Importance of Preparing Your House ... FOR SALE! by Bob Winkler

I should have entitled this article "Sell Your House Faster and For More Money." It might have drawn more attention to the topic since when you do prepare your house for sale it will sell faster and probably for more money. The purpose of this article is not to explain in detail what you should do in preparing your home for sale or staging it for showing. The purpose is to emphasize and explain why this preparation should be done and how and when to get started.

Realtors often talk about Price, Product and Promotion when we list a client's home. We, along with the client, will determine market price, explain what we will do to market (promote) the house and what the client should do in preparing the house (product) for sale. If we do our job in marketing the home and the client does their job in getting the house ready, we can usually turn to price being the problem if the house is not selling.

As real estate professionals, we do an excellent job in determining price and marketing the property. However, as hard as we try, we do not do as good a job in getting our clients to prepare their homes for sale. Why? Well, determining price and marketing the home is easy ... basically, that is what we do for a living. On the other hand, our clients do not prepare homes for sale for a living. They are busy going to their jobs, grocery shopping, taking vacations, running to soccer games, etc. And, it costs money to improve and prepare your house for sale.

As the years go by, I am becoming more aggressive in educating my clients on how important it is to prepare their house for the market. I recently had two success stories that help me continue to talk to my clients about taking this important step. The first was a listing in the eastern/central part of town. My clients asked for my advice and followed it to the tee. Their preparation costs were also minimal. They agreed to rent a small storage unit to eliminate furniture that made the rooms look smaller and blocked hallways. They also rearranged the kitchen because a refrigerator had been placed in a corner where the table and chairs should have been for eating. We cleaned the windows and the client agreed to take down the lace curtains which made the house feel like "gramma's. The house sold for close to asking price in a few weeks during a period of a buyer's market. A recent letter from my client stated, "Bob's ... marketing and presentation advice was especially "right on mark". The results speak volumes. Bob sold our house in a very short time ...we also got very near our asking price and we settled at a price higher than we were expecting.

The second success story was a bachelor living on a very busy street. Basically, his house was in good condition. We did, however, bring some of his furniture up from the family room to be staged in an empty living room, replaced the screen on the front door, cleaned and organized the garage and edged the front lawn for greater curb appeal. The house sold in a relatively short time for full price, despite the busy street.

To simplify the process, let me share with you what Martha Webb and Sarah Parsons Zackheim outline in their book, Dress Your House For Success. 5: Fast, Easy Steps To Selling Your House ... For The Highest Possible Price!. These 5 Easy Steps are: (1) Uncluttering (2) Cleaning (3) Repairing (4) Neutralizing and (5) Dynamizing. Just thinking about these five areas could help you get started. Details on how to go about completing this process can be obtained from further reading or consulting your real estate professional.

When I meet with clients to list their home for sale this is the discussion I will have with them:

1. We have to start thinking of your home as a product for sale, it is no longer your personal possession.

2. It may seem like I am on the edge of offending you when I suggest things to do in preparing your house for sale. However, this is not my objective. My objective is to be candid and my responsibility is to help you sell your house in the shortest period of time for the highest price.
3. Tell me what your budget is and what amount of time you want to devote in getting your home ready for sale.

4. Using the 5 steps mentioned above, let's outline the most effective things we can do in getting your house ready to sell, taking into consideration your budget and the amount of time you have to devote to the process.

In conclusion, selling your home is a business and in all businesses "you have to spend money to make money". I am often amazed as I show property what people will not do to try to sell their home. If it is the Fall and you plan to sell your home in the Spring, contact a real estate professional immediately for advice so you have the time to prepare your home over the ensuing months. If you plan to sell in maybe five years and know that major remodeling will be needed to sell your home, do the remodeling now and enjoy the pleasures of a new room for a number of years.

Just remember that preparing your home for sale is just as important, if not more so, than pricing and marketing plans.


Bob Winkler
Broker Associate
Distinctive Properties Ltd.
55 Madison St. Suite 155
Denver, Co. 80206

303-316-2134
bob@bobwinkler.com