5 Important Steps to Take When Selling Your Home

Wouldn’t it be nice if when you were ready to move, you could just move and not have to worry about the fuss and hassle of selling your home? Unfortunately, that’s not reality. Selling your home is a hectic, complicated process, but while it’s easy to overlook certain details, those little details are what could hurt your chances of a good sale in the long run. The next time you find yourself putting your house on the market, make sure you check off all these steps in order to make the process run more smoothly.

Boost Your Curb Appeal

You might not have done much with your yard when you lived in your home, and that was fine. You’re not a gardner. But the next people who live there might be. When moving, it’s important to boost your curb appeal so you can make a good impression on potential buyers before they even set foot inside. A nice flower bed or a new coat of paint on the exterior of the home could make all the difference, and it could even help you raise the asking price. Of course, it’s no good to have a beautiful exterior while the interior is falling apart, so make sure to make any updates needed for the interior as well.

Research the Current Market

The market has almost certainly changed since you bought your house, but you might not have had cause to look at it again until now. Do you know whether it’s a buyer’s or seller’s market? What do other houses in your neighborhood typically go for? If you set an asking price that’s too high or too low, you may turn the right buyers away, and while you can change your asking price, it’s best to get it right the first time. Do a little research to figure out a reasonable number based on your house and similar houses in the neighborhood.

Hire a Real Estate Agent

Opinions differ as to whether or not you need to hire a real estate agent when selling your home. Sure, there’s no law that says you have to and some sellers prefer to handle it on their own, but this will certainly make your life easier. Your real estate agent will already know the market trends, will post your home to all the right real estate apps, and will negotiate with the buyer’s agent to get the best price for your home. It just makes the process easier and you’ll need as much of that as you can get when selling your home.

Take Lots of Pictures

Get your home in the best shape it can be for the staging, and then take pictures that show it in the best light. These pictures should be well-lit and professional, something that will immediately attract the attention of buyers when they search for listings online. You might even hire a crew to film a virtual tour of your home. Most buyers start their search online, and virtual tours are a great way to help them feel connected to the house before they even move in.

Remove Personal Details When Staging

First of all, if you have any pets, time to move them out of the house, along with their toys, food bowls, and certainly their dander. Family photos and posters in the kids’ rooms should come down, too. The goal of a home staging is to make it so that the buyer can see themselves living there. That’s difficult to do if the house is still specific to your family. It should look appealing, but also a bit like a blank slate. Like anyone could live there.

Next, just open your house and watch the potential buyers be wowed. Your real estate agent will take care of much of the marketing as well as the negotiations, which leaves you more time to focus on your big move.