Preparing Your Home for Sale

Selling a home presents a number of unique challenges. From finding the right real estate agent, (or doing it yourself), to showcasing your home to prospective buyers, it can be an arduous and time consuming process. However, before your first showing, there are useful steps you can take to help make your home more salable. Your Credit Union is here to break them down for you.

Start With the Exterior

It may sound like a no brainer, but when trying to make your home presentable, the best place to start is the exterior. This is the first image of your home a prospective buyer will see. Few things are as repellant as an unattractive exterior. Start with your landscaping, ensuring your lawn is properly maintained. Take a look at your paint, and roofing if necessary to ensure there are minimal signs of wear and tear. Small steps go a long way to helping your home feel more inviting. Even porch ornaments such as a welcome mat will help build a homey feeling for prospective buyers.

Declutter, Repair, Beautify

All three of these aspects go together to help make your home more inviting and give buyers a better sense of what living in the home will be like. Begin first by decluttering, ridding your home of anything unnecessary that will hamper a buyer's ability to see the home how it is. Next, assess what interior and exterior items are in need of minor repairs. Chipped paint and scuffed floors may seem unimportant but they can seriously alter a homebuyer's perception. Lastly, ensure that your home is always sparkling clean. Spend several minutes every day to maintain cleanliness. This will help accentuate simple touches that make the home more inviting.

Learn to Separate Yourself from the Space

For many, it can be difficult to truly separate yourself from a place where you've lived for an extended amount of time. Put away the family pictures, nice decorations that appeal to your tastes, and anything else that makes the home feel innately yours. The reason for this is simple: buyers like homes they can picture their families in, not yours. Strive for a home that feels welcoming, but not specific to your tastes. When painting, look at neutral colors that bring out natural light. Use decorations, bed spreads, etc. that appeal to a wide audience so you're more likely to draw the eye of more prospective buyers. While at first it can be difficult to separate yourself from a space, remember the ultimate goal is to move on into another place you'll call home, and hopefully, find a buyer for your current home in the process.

Buying a home can be a challenging process, but a Pre-Approval and Home Loan from Your Credit Union helps simplify an already complex experience. Visit us at www.bcefcu.com or stop by one of our three branches today for more information.