Putting your home on the market has plenty of implications. For instance, you want to make sure that it lists as quickly as possible for the right price, which entails making a plethora of preparations while somehow also avoiding mistakes that sellers invariably make. No doubt, this whole undertaking is made even more challenging when you are a busy parent who also has to juggle childcare and household responsibilities.
But don’t fret! There are actually ways you can simplify what might look to be an impossible mission so you can get ready to successfully sell your home at top dollar — and with minimal upheaval to your family to boot. Here’s how.
Have a Plan
Like everything else, the gargantuan task of prepping your home for sale will benefit from a solid plan. Ideally, such a plan will break down the many tasks that you will have to confront leading up to your scheduled showing and even beyond the final sale of your house.
Having an open house checklist will undoubtedly do wonders in keeping you organized, which, in turn, will guarantee that your listing is at its most appealing for the perusal of potential buyers. According to Redfin, your checklist should include essential to-dos, running the gamut from cleaning your home to ensuring that pets and kids are not underfoot, as well as specifics on what to do with valuables and how to maximize natural light — the list goes on.
Get the Family Involved
Much of the success of your home’s impending sale relies heavily on staging. This can be a next-to-impossible task when your family is still living in it, especially with kids around who, as we all know, seem to have made it their life’s work to make messes. Not only that, but open house showings can also be disruptive to the family schedule.
Surprisingly, it can be done. The key lies in getting the whole family involved, including the little ones. Communicating the impending change clearly will go a long way in eliminating drama. Better yet, you may even be able to get them to take a measure of the responsibility, such as packing away their toys, keeping their rooms tidy, and just being generally helpful.
Clean Up
As a general rule of thumb, you want your listing to be clean, clutter-free, and not at all personal when you’re showing it. The objective being that potential buyers should be able to see themselves at home in your home, which can be hard to pull off when you have toys, clothes, and other personal items strewn about your home.
Real estate agents and experienced home sellers will likely tell you to start by decluttering. This, in itself, is a huge job, so it’s smart to breakdown your decluttering efforts area by area or room by room to leave no stone unturned. Moreover, this should not be limited to spaces and surfaces that you can see. Know that potential buyers often look into closets and drawers, too, so don’t just stash personal items in there. Rather, consider putting them in storage.
And of course, don’t forget to deep clean your home before a showing. Take note that a house well-lived will have stains and smells that its residents normally won’t notice but will be glaring to visitors, so put yourself in the latter’s shoes and go over the house with a fine-toothed comb — or more accurately, a high-powered vacuum cleaner and other cleaning implements. Again, do it room by room to keep yourself from being overwhelmed by this process.
Indeed, finding time to prep a home for sale with a busy parent’s schedule seems like a lot of trouble, but the fact is, it’s more than worthwhile. When you have sold your old home at the price you had in mind and your family is settled into your new one, your struggle will be but a distant memory. So, consider these tips to achieve what used to seem like the impossible. At the end of the day, you only have yourself to thank for it.
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