Hi eveyone...need your help. My dh and I are planning to put our house on the market within a time frame of 14 days to get ready.
We interviewed so many, mortgage companies, realtors, look at so many new and resale homes for sale within our area and other towns/cities. Checked out the schools from other cities and studied all the marketing paper work given to us. But we thought about how much our children love the school district they attend and don't want to move far. Major factor to us. So we found a home...actually me. I found the home that I really fall in love with...still in the same neighbor but it is acutally down the street. Anywhoo...Im excited!!!

Bigger square footage and view of the mtns. Big yard and etc...Now, I need tips on getting ready for our home to sell...we about 14 days. We would like to sell this house in a time of frame of less than 30 days. If you know what I mean. My dh advise me to make a list to fix...so far I listed 20 things from patching the holes and repainting and replace those standard doors to have curve appeal. We have budget of $500.00 to do all this.

So give me your savy-frugal tips/expert advise on how to go about preparing our home for sale!? You guys have been given me so much support and tips, since I joined...very grateful!!!

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My JSEVENS: JJ, Jaren, Jocelyn, Jamie, Jasmine, Jordan
"Mom of Seven...Darn Proud"

Walk through your house, get a friend to help. Pretend you are the buyer and look around. What needs cleaned up? Fixed? Painted? Gotten rid of?

Start decluttering your closets, cabinets, etc.

They say to put away personal items like photos to allow the potential buyer the ability to imagine themselves living there.

The more you can pack up/get rid of the more space your home will appear to have.

Good luck, and congrats on your new home!

Good tips!
Anything cosmetic that can be fixed...do it...but as for the doors, unless they are in bad shape or diststracting from the house...leave them, doors are expensive to replace if it's not necessary.
Get rid of ALL clutter...if you can store your boxes insread of putting them in the garage or basement, even better. NO personal photos or knick-knacks at all.
And a good tip when someone comes in to look at the house, instead of lighting candles, sprinkle some cinnamon on a cookie sheet and pop it in the oven on low. This was a tip from our realtor!

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"When it comes down to it, I let them think what they want. If they care enough to bother with what I do, then I'm already better than them."~ Marilyn Monroe

declutter everywhere. make sure your yard is spick and span, the gardens look good, everything. take down anything personal, like family photos, and replace them with some nuetral pictures if you can. what i did when we sold our house was made up a couple batches of chocolate chip cookie dough, rolled it into balls and froze them, and the morning of the showing i would pop em in the oven and set them out on a plate for the viewers to have. i also put up a note in front of them warning of nuts incase of allergies. they were a huge hit with potential buyers. it also makes the house smell great.
remove any air fresheners that are strongly scented that can be a huge turnoff, for a nice smell sprinkle some cinnamon on a pan and pop it into a hot oven for a few minutes and it will make the house smell great. you could play quiet music in the background, make sure all doors to all rooms are open so that they don't seem to be off limits to any potential buyers. clean litter boxes the night befre and sprinkle liberally with baking soda, and remove any dogs from the yard or inside fo the house. they can be scary.

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Kimberley

"there is nothing to worry about, just plenty to think about" from an episode of Extreme Makeover House edition

check out my blog:
http://mommysavers.com/boards/journa...owjournal&j=21

We just moved a few months ago and we sold our house in less than a week. I worked like a DOG for 2 weeks getting it ready. We rented a storage unit and I packed 25 big moving boxes and put it away. I knew I wouldn't be without it for long and would have to pack it anyway so I was ruthless. I took all of our out of season clothes (I am thinking you live in Hawaii so this may not apply to you ), all the kitchen appliances that we don't use every day (like the foodsaver, the cuisinart, all that stuff), all the holiday decorations, picture frames, photo albums, tons of toys and board games, etc. and put it ALL in the storage unit. I also cleared our attic out and put it all in there so the attic looked huge. I hit every single closet in our house and reduced the contents by about half. I cleared every surface (my kitchen counters were bare, the bathroom counters were bare, etc.). The house was gleaming. The 4th people that looked at it bought it which was such a blessing because it is a pain in the neck to get ready to show the house when you have little kids! Good luck. Don't forget the yard! Get rid of dead plants, put away all the potted stuff if it doesn't look perfect, put the toys up, and use the blower to get all the dust and stuff off your walkway and driveway. Don't forget your garage!

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maggie

When taking pictures of the walls use white toothpaste to fill in the holes. (that is if your walls are white) Fresh paint really does help. People tend to look at the kitchen and bathrooms the most. What ever updating you do should be in those areas. Everyone is right about the decluttering. It is very hard to imagine yourself in a house that is full of someone elses things. Our realator suggested leaving a note on the fridge or counter telling the people your reason for moving, good things about the neighbors or neighborhood, why you love the house, ect. Something short, but personal. That reminds me you want your fridge to be cleared (no magnets, pictures, coupons, ect.) Light fixtures are a big plus, people like to have updated light fixtures and faucets. This can be realatively inexpensive. Clean the carpets. Nice curb appeal is very important too. It is the first impression.

Good Luck with it.

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~Jodi~

All of these are really great tips. Some other things that may/may not have been suggested:

1. Go ahead and repaint, especially if your colors are not neutral and you have lots of holes in the walls.

2. Put fresh flowers out (cut from your garden, perhaps) daily. Potential buyers love to see things like that.

3. "Rake" your carpet before you leave. Nothing says "wow" to a potential buyer than a carpet with no foot prints.

4. Bake cookies before you leave for an open house or when you know the house will be shown.

5. Remove personal pictures, kids artwork from the fridge, etc.. you want the potential buyer to envision themselves living there, and if you have your imprint all over the house, then they can't do that.

6. Rent a carpet shampooer and shampoo the rugs. Clean the baseboards, door jams, windowsills, ever where that dust accumlates but we never think about cleaning.

Watch Sell this House!

and good luck!!!

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check out my blog: http://anniebananie.wordpress.com

One of the tips I have seen on that cable show "Sell this House" was to remove furniture to make the rooms more spacious feeling. So if you are going to rent a storage unit then take out an extra chair, dresser, end table etc. Then rearrange your furniture to make you home seem as big as possible.

Make your home "neutral" in style.

Thank u, guys for all the tips. I want to say that our home is in Arizona...currently living here but originally from Oahu,Hawaii...some of u saw my profile of my pic of my daughter and I with flower leis. I always get leis back home from my family for any occasion like my daughter's kindergarten graduation.

So declutter is the key regarding anything like family pics, excess furnitures..gotcha!!

Yes, I do have holes on doors b/c we have cheap a$$ doors and holes behind the doors where kids keeps slamming it against the wall. I got to touch/fix that up. I think we might have to touch up cracks in gargage when we first got our home it is built brand new...that was 5 years ago. Since then...our house settled...so got to some patching up. It is a one story 4 bedrooms and 2 baths, 2 car garage.

We just landscape our back yard this past March. We have small yard but very nice landscape yard. So...we still have young trees and etc... Very green grass...image that living in the desert. And I still complain about $90.00 water bill..yikes, I say.

But most of all...we got a huge patio 12feet(out) by 36 wide....it is far the only biggest patio build in our neighborhood....that was done 2 years ago. You can ball room dance on the patio...lol.

I just printed all the advise...keeping it for my FYI only in my notebook of repairs regarding our home sale. I really needed it(dh was stressing me out!!), thanks u all for the tips. I am so grateful for joining this mmysvr forum!!

Mahalo nui loa! (means: thank u very much!)<3<3
dabie

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My JSEVENS: JJ, Jaren, Jocelyn, Jamie, Jasmine, Jordan
"Mom of Seven...Darn Proud"

Dabie...I just came across this article and thought it would be really helpful for you....

Living On A Dime- Get More for Your Home

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"When it comes down to it, I let them think what they want. If they care enough to bother with what I do, then I'm already better than them."~ Marilyn Monroe