Prepare house for sale | What not to fix when selling a house - YouTube

Do you want to know how to prepare  your house for sale, and learn what  

not to fix when selling your house?  Well, you're in luck because I'll be  

talking all about how to get your house  ready to sell in today's video! Let's go!

Hi everybody! Welcome back to my channel  - I'm Mike Iwinski with Real 1 Realty  

in South Barrington. I'm your local real estate  expert out here in the suburbs of Chicago.  

I've lived here my whole life, and on this  channel, I talk all about buying and selling  

real estate in the greater Chicago area.  This is video 3 in my home seller series.  

In past weeks, I've covered frequently  asked questions on selling, and how to  

correctly price your home for sale. Today I'll be  talking all about preparing your house for sale.  

In future videos I'll cover all these  topics you see on screen, and much more,  

all from the perspective of a home seller. So if  that's something you're interested in and you want  

to get notified when I release those videos, just  subscribe to the channel and click the bell icon,  

and they will come to you. Now, most people  know that when preparing your house for sale,  

decluttering and basic cleaning are kind of a  bare minimum. But make sure to watch till the  

end because there are a few other ideas that I use  to give my sellers a secret weapon when selling.  

Let's get started. Decluttering. So you've got  stuff. We all do. It's a thing. Especially when  

you have kids. Oh my gosh when you have kids.  The stuff they collect is never ending. Toys and  

books and Legos® and cars and dolls and plates  and boxes...sorry where were we? Oh right all  

the stuff we have. So yeah you've got stuff. But  someone who wants to buy your house doesn't want  

to see any of it. So what do you do? You've got to  figure out a way to put it all away and declutter.  

So your goal through this process is not only to  remove everything that makes the house look messy,  

but also to make the house look like  it's almost not being even lived in.  

For example, the kitchen counter should  be free of just about everything.  

Also, take out furniture where you  can - especially the bigger pieces.  

You want enough to show that the  room is large enough for furniture,  

but not so much where the buyers will have  to actually step around to see your house.  

Now obviously I know this is not how  people live and it might seem extreme,  

but removing as much as you can makes a huge  difference in the perception of open space.  

As far as what to do with all  the stuff you're taking out,  

obviously this is a personal choice. For me,  renting a separate storage space while selling  

your house sort of seems excessive and a huge  amount of hassle having to take things back and  

forth. So some people start packing everything  early and just load up the garage full of boxes.  

This is not a bad idea, but if you decide to do  this, try to stack things where the cars would  

normally go, and try to mimic the size of a  car. Potential buyers need to visualize how  

their cars would fit and see the walls so  they can see how they would use the space.  

Also don't stack boxes under the attic entry  because the home inspector needs to get up there.  

Cleaning. I think cleaning is a really personal  area. You know, one person's clean is another  

person's dirty. If you're able to, I recommend  paying for a cleaning company to do a deep clean  

prior to listing your house. You could do it  yourself, but these people will come in and get  

your house clean in a way that you either can't or  you may not have a patience for. But if you're not  

able or don't want to pay somebody then roll up  your sleeves and give it your best shot. You'll  

want to clean every surface of your home including  the walls and the baseboards. Sometimes you'll  

just use a duster but other times you'll really  have to scrub. Fixing. These next three areas  

are pretty closely related, so let's just skip  ahead. Pre-listing inspection. I'm guessing that  

most people want to do as little as possible  when they're fixing their home up for sale.  

Nobody wants to put money into something  that they won't get back, I totally get it.  

But look at it this way - unless you're going  to be selling your house as-is, you're likely  

going to have to fix something up anyway. Not many  buyers will want to buy a house that's in need of  

major repairs, so let's try and get ahead of it.  I usually always suggest that my selling clients  

get a pre-listing inspection. If you've never  heard of this, it's exactly what it sounds like.  

It's a regular home inspection like what you  would get on the home you're looking to buy,  

but you would get it done on your house before  you list it. So you would hire a home inspector  

who will check everything in your house and  give you a complete report of any issues or  

repairs that are needed. By doing this, you get  to choose what's going to get fixed ahead of time,  

and you won't get caught by surprise when the  buyer submits their list of things to fix from  

their own inspection. Now there's another nice  side benefit to this as well. If you choose to fix  

everything on the list, you can actually use  this as a marketing tool when you list the house.  

In the description of your listing you could  say "pre-listing inspection conducted and  

all major repairs completed. Report is available".  Competition. When you're selling your house,  

your house will be competing against  other houses to catch the eye of a buyer.  

So what do the other houses look like? What are  you being judged against? In the 2nd video of this  

series on pricing your home I talked at length  about the benefits of viewing your competition  

when selling your house. You can watch that video  right here. So after you've already decluttered,  

deep cleaned, and fixed your house's major  problems, find the 3-5 most comparable houses  

to yours and look carefully through their pictures  online to see if you can get any more information  

about what the house is really like. However if  you're going to list your house with a real estate  

agent, ask your agent to take you through those  properties. When you walk through, take note of  

what you find. For example, is there a strange  odor? Or are the white kitchen cabinets really  

just painted and starting to flake off? By walking  through, you'll know exactly what your competition  

looks like and have a better idea of how you need  to prepare your house to compete against them.  

If you like this video, please give me a  thumbs up. The YouTube algorithm really  

likes that and really helps me out. Thanks for  watching, and I'll see you in the next video!