Readying your house for sale on the cheap

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Published Date 7/26/2023

If you’re planning to sell your home anytime soon and you have little to no budget to get it ready to list, Realtor.com’s Lisa Marie Conklin offers some lowdown on doing things on the down-low. Of all the things you can do to get top dollar for your home, the most important is curb appeal. The rest is basically window dressing, so to speak. “In other words, you have to make your well-loved, lived-in home catch the eye of potential buyers in the best possible way.”

Conklin reminds you that buyers make decisions about your listing in the first seven seconds of arrival. If you’re strapped for cash, however, how do you draw attention away from the ’90s linoleum floor in the bathroom? Throw some fancy new tile on the backsplash. Perhaps you don’t even want to throw money at improvements you’ll never get to enjoy. So she offers a few tips and cheap tricks from the pros to make your home irresistible to homebuyers.

Paint. It’s always the first go-to on any listing — be it empty, old, or even just 10 years old. Just take a close look at the rooms homebuyers focus on the most — like bathrooms and kitchens. Those are smaller spaces that don’t take much paint because there are generally more cabinets than wall space. Some new paint in the living room — especially if it’s one of the first rooms seen upon entering the home, is always a good idea, too. Oh — and strangely enough — new paint on your front door and your garage door, too. Did you know that your garage door can make up as much as 40% of the front of the home? A quick coat of fresh paint will go a long way toward brightening a buyer’s first impression.

While home staging is indeed an art form, there is a lot you can do on your own to copy their tactics. Now is the time to declutter (including inside closets and your pantry), remove almost everything from countertops, strategically place or remove furniture to show off the size of each room, draw or eliminate heavy drapery, and add light into dark corners. If you’re clueless, however, many professional stagers offer a consultation or hourly fee — much cheaper than using all or any of their products. Sometimes something as simple as moving the sofa to a different position in the house makes a world of difference. Homebuyers should be able to see most of the floors and ceilings of any area, no matter how small. If that means packing boxes early or renting a storage space or that of a friend or neighbor for a while, this is the time to do it.

While refinishing hardwood floors is pricey, you can easily breathe new life into old floors and even fill in scratches by mopping on a water-based polyurethane wood floor restorer to get back that rich, high-gloss finish of a newer floor. Conklin adds that one application should last through all the foot traffic of your open houses.

Now’s the time to rent that carpet and upholstery cleaner — especially if you have pets that leave their gifts of odor and fur behind. “Homebuyers pick up pet smells as soon as they walk through the front door,” says Conklin. “But sellers tend to be nose-blind and don’t realize how badly Fido is stinking up the home.” She advises you to invite your brutally honest friends over after you clean all the pet areas, and if they still smell pet-related odors, find the culprit and deodorize it.

Natural light, of course, makes a home feel larger, cleaner, and more inviting. So wash your windows and remove the screens, since they filter light. Install full-spectrum lightbulbs that mimic the midday sun for rooms lacking in natural light.

Second-hand stores like your local Habitat for Humanity ReStore often contain a cornucopia of items to make a few improvements but have limited funds. They offer a ton of renovation items, including paint, cabinets, hardware, appliances, tile, etc., for affordable prices. And your purchase helps contribute to affordable homeownership in your community.

Your yard can no doubt use some sprucing up as well. Grab some garden gloves and tools and pull weeds, wash surfaces, get rid of clutter, etc. This is one of those high-impact, no-to-low-dollar investment areas that can make a huge difference.

Realtor, TBWS

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