If you think selling your home is easy, you're in for a surprise. Listing your home is only the first step. After that, you have to get your house ready to show potential home buyers.
If your home doesn't have general appeal, you're going to have a harder time getting it sold. There were 5.34 million homes sold in 2018. You need to stand out from this competition.
Are you worried about making a mistake during the home sale process? Below are five common mistakes that you need to avoid.
1. Keeping Your Home Personal
You want someone to feel like they can live and own your home when they visit. It's hard to do that when you have personal items and unique decorations around your home.
You need to remove personal items and make your home as neutral as possible. Doing this will help your home appeal to a wider range of people.
2. Making too Many Improvements
Making your home ready for the next owner sounds nice. But it isn't always the best thing to do. Northern Virginia Real Estate warns if you make the wrong improvements, you could be out that money and unable to recoup your cost.
Every dollar you spend making improvements should make you at least a dollar more when you sell. Outside of necessary repairs, ignore everything else that won't add to your sell price.
3. Not Organizing Closets
Many people decide to move into their own homes so that they have the space for all their belongings. If someone tours your home and sees a full and disorganized closet, it gives a bad impression.
When this happens, it gives the appearance that your home doesn't have as much storage as it really does. Doing a little organization and cleaning can provide a much better impression to home buyers.
4. Not Staging Your Home
While you don't want your home to appear personal, you also don't want your home to appear empty. This means you need to do some work to stage your home when potential buyers visit.
You don't need to go crazy here. Focus on the main areas of your home.
Some of these areas include your living room, entry-ways, and backyard. You can still furnish your other rooms, but don't worry about spending too much time or money there.
5. Not Picking a Good Real Estate Agent
If you've never sold a home before, you may not know all the ins and outs of the process. You run the risk of making a mistake and not getting good value from your home.
A real estate agent will solve this problem. If you want more info on selling a house, contact a local agent today to learn what they can do to help.
Minimize Your Mistakes During the Home Sale Process
There is a lot more to the home sale process than putting your house on listing sites. If you don't do the work to make your home presentable to home buyers, you're never going to get it sold. Make sure to avoid the mistakes above to improve your chances of making the sale.
Do you want to learn more real estate tips that can help you sell your home? Head back to our blog to read what else you need to know.
