[~Mo+Moosh~]

We are currently in the process of preparing our 3 bed, 2 bathroom weatherboard home to put on the market. It will be the first time we have sold a house.

So I'd love to hear your tips and tricks for helping us to dress the place so someone falls in love with it and it sells quickly and we can move on to bigger and better things.

Ideally we don't want to spend a heap of money in preparing it and obviously need to maximise the sale price.

[AllegraM]

Freshly mulched gardens always look great and this is not a huge expense.

Weatherboard can get a bit grotty so I would suggest hiring an outdoor house cleaner to spruce it up (or do this yourself).

Evidence of a current termite inspection is always appealing to buyers. Obviously only if the report gives the all-clear!

Check that all lightbulbs are working.

Good luck! We are about to list our house too and we have never had it looking so good. Nothing like the potential of increased $$$s to make us get motivated.

[KT1978]

Take out everything nonessential so the house looks bigger. 50% of your stuff should be in storage. (makes the move easier anyway). Have lots of clear bench top space and floor space.

Open blinds - make everything look bright and airy. Sugar soap walls if they are grubby.

Make small repairs where needed.

Bright cushions, towels etc if you can. Use nice linen on the beds. Make sure the house smells fresh and clean.

[Stellajoy]

Put everything g away except furniture, EVERYTHiNG, even fridge magnets. Toaster, nick nacks, garden stuff.

We also got someone in to paint the entire inside with just one coat for $1500 and it looked amazing.

[Stellajoy]

I also second mulch for all garden beds, totally cheap and easy and makes everything look better

[charlottesmum04]

Be careful of things that you know are a cheap fix. Buyers will take thousands off an asking price in their head for things that might only cost hundreds to fix. ( ie it might cost you $100 and a weekend to repaint a slightly dodgy wall a buyer will knock off $5,000 of any offer they might make to cover repainting costs)

Make the gardens look nice. Buy a little dripper hose and put it on the lawns for an hour or so at night. It wont use to much water but will make it look nice and green if needed.

Ask a friend of a friend to come through your house and use their house buying eyes. Preferably someone who has never been in your house before. Ask them to tell you what would put them off buying your house.

Hire one of those cheap carpet cleaners from woolies ( or get a carpet guy out) freshly clean carpet always looks better and feels nice underfoot and gives you the excuse to insist people dont wear shoes during the opens.

[smithsonian]

My best tips - hire a local gardener/ lawn mower / maintenance person for at least a days work. Unless you're garden is immaculate that will be money well spent as they will see things you miss and get a lot of work done, leaving the outside looking great - dont forget to give them some pretty annuals to plant
Gurney the outside

Repaint inside or if its not needed or you cant afford it then -
Walk around your house with a paintbrush and a tin of primer, you will be amazed how many spots you find that need painting - door edges, skirting boards etc that never got painted or need a new coat. Follow up with the correct colour
Get in professional cleaners for a spring clean if you can afford it, otherwise scrub everything.
Hire a storage unit and take anything you can to it, leaving only what you need to live and decorative pieces and nice furniture that makes the house look lived in.
Clean the windows inside and out
clean the lightswitches
Make the beds with nice linen
Clear every surface you can and then just put 1 or 2 things on it like a vase of flowers on a table or a pretty perfume bottle on a bedside
Clean and spot treat all the floors
Clean up after any pets and take them away with you for inspections
Remove anything hugely personal or offbeat as it may put some people off even if you love it.
Make sure everything works ( light, taps, doors dont stick etc)
Good luck

[pollyjo]

As a RE Agent the best advise I can give you is CLEAN!! A sparkling clean house always impresses. Make sure you do windows & tracks, skirting boards, light switches, and scrub your bathroom/s and kitchen to within an inch of their lives

Same goes for outside - mow lawns and trim edges, top up mulch in garden beds, trim bushes/deadhead roses etc and make sure you water everything well so it is nice and green.

Other than that, remove all non-essential clutter/stuff (take the opportunity to have a big clean-out!).

You don't have to spend a fortune, mostly you just need elbow grease

A good tip is to look at some nice homes (maybe in the same style as you home) on realestate.com to see how they are presented. You can pick up some good ideas this way.

Good luck!

[Goggie]

Declutter. Nothing except a lamp on bedside table, maybe a frame or candle on tall boy, all surfaces empty and minimalist.
Pack everything you don't need in the garage, get it out of the house. If your kitchen cupboards are full, pack half of it away so it's look like there's lots of room because people do open cupboards!

A fresh bunch of flowers at opens always looks nice, along with a nice smell so burn a candle or bake something, open windows for fresh air etc

De-cobweb the house, it's amazing how good the front can look if this is done.

I agree with pp re the mulch, you can spend $100 making garden beds look like new.

Sugar soap walls and kitchen cupboards, it's amazing stuff

In the bathroom, don't hang towels up at all - leave the towel rails bare or leave folded towels like a hotel. That tip was from the photographer that photographed our house for sale. He said hanging towels even if clean make it look 'too lived in' whereas no towels or folded ones say clean.


Split the jobs up so say spend 1 weekend on garden, 1 on declutter and throwing things out and one on tidying and styling the rooms one room at a time.

Edit: Forgot to say good luck!

This post has been edited by Goggie: 03/02/2013, 03:34 PM

[Chchgirl]

As pp's have said, make it nice and clean, tidy and decluttered, but having sold four houses previously and going to put this one on the market in September, don't go overboard as you will always get people come through and pick it apart and want it for nothing, no matter what you do!

Good luck with it all..