Read This Before You Put Your Home On the Market
Thinking Of Selling An Older House?
Mark Nash, Coldwell Banker
Before selling a house that’s a few decades old, you may be tempted to spend lots of money fixing it up. However, unless the house is in serious disrepair, large-scale refurbishing is rarely worth the price.
Better strategy: Get rid of the eyesores, but leave other features that buyers would expect in an older house. Many buyers might be attracted to period features, such as wall paneling from the 1950s or sliding glass doors in ranch-style houses of the 1960s.
Ask a few real estate agents what changes they would recommend for getting the best price and hastening the sale. Go to open houses in your area and listen to what shoppers like and dislike about other houses. They’ll likely have similar opinions about your own house. Areas where it makes sense to consider improvements…
THE FRONT YARD
Curb appeal is important, but it’s rarely worthwhile to re-landscape the front yard because you won’t necessarily recoup the cost, especially if your taste in shrubbery doesn’t appeal to prospective buyers.
Cheaper alternatives: Trim bushes, plant grass over any bare spots in the lawn and plant flowers that will be in bloom when real estate agents show the house. Spread decorative mulch under bushes and around flowerbeds. Also, make sure that unsightly cracks in walkways and driveways are repaired.
ENTRANCEWAY
You don’t have to spend much to enhance the first impression the entrance to your house creates. Examples…
• Replace damaged screen doors or storm doors.
• If necessary, repaint or re-stain the front door.
• Buy new metal house numbers, and put them where they can be seen clearly. Reason: Metal numbers look good and are inexpensive.
• Set out a few potted plants near the entranceway if they make it look more attractive.
INSIDE PAINT
Repaint a room if the walls have smudges or scuff marks. When paneling is chipped or in poor condition, check with a contractor to find out your cheapest option—repairing it, painting it or removing it entirely and painting the wall.
Also, if wallpaper has become unsightly, remove it and paint the walls. Reason: Buyers might dislike the paint or wallpaper you choose, but they know that it’s easier to paint over paint.
To create a feeling of spaciousness, use light-colored paint for all rooms that people see when they walk in, typically the foyer, living room and dining area.
FLOORING
Replace carpeting if there’s any chance that a buyer could trip over a tear or a wrinkle. The replacement need not be expensive—just use carpeting that isn’t unsightly.
If there are hardwood floors under the old carpet, weigh the price of new carpeting against the cost of refinishing the floor and buying inexpensive area rugs. Go with the cheaper option. Today, many buyers prefer wood floors.
FURNITURE
Most buyers don’t like houses that are cluttered with furniture. Get rid of any pieces that have unsightly damage or stains. Also, envision the house with an agent and two potential buyers walking through it. Then, eliminate furniture that would make it difficult for them to walk around easily.
Smart: Sell unneeded furniture to help defray the costs of needed repairs to the house.
KITCHEN
Elaborate kitchens are one of today’s big fads, but it’s a bad idea to completely remodel your kitchen just to make the house more attractive to buyers. Reason: You’re very unlikely to recoup the expense.
Better and cheaper: Repaint or restain the cabinets unless you’ve recently done that. This is a job for which you should usually hire a professional painter. Many buyers inspect kitchen cabinets close up, and they’re likely to be impressed with a professional painting or staining.
Even if appliances are old, don’t replace them unless they’re damaged or no longer work.
Important: Take nearly everything off the countertops when it’s time to show the house because buyers like to envision the space with their own equipment and utensils.
THE AIR ITSELF
Houses that smell like tobacco smoke are a turnoff to buyers, so stop smoking in the house for about a week before it goes on the market. During that time, open the windows several times to air out the house thoroughly.
These steps might not completely rid the house of all the odor, especially if tobacco smoke has seeped into curtains and upholstery, but they’ll help.
BATHROOM
Replace any fixture or equipment that has more than minor damage or doesn’t work. Then thoroughly clean—especially the tile—and install a new shower curtain and matching throw rug.
Also, replace the toilet seat if it has any signs of wear, and make sure that the grout and caulking look fresh.
CLOSETS
Older houses are often short on closet space, but there are inexpensive ways to make the storage space appear more adequate.
Examples: Remove as many items as it takes to make most of the back wall visible…if the closet is dark, paint it a light color…install a closet organizer that increases capacity by adding coat hanger rods and/or shelves.
CLEANING
Once you’ve made the necessary additions and repairs, clean the entire house, including all windows. The house can appear lived-in—with a couple of books off the shelf, for instance—but it should be free from conspicuous grime and dirt.
If you don’t want to do the job yourself, hire a professional cleaning service.
HOT WATER HEATER
If you have an old or corroded water heater, buyers will usually demand a price reduction that’s larger than the cost of a new one.
In contrast, a new water heater—that a seller can show off to buyers—costs less than the amount that it adds to the value of the house.
THE ROOF EXCEPTION
Roofs are an exception to the rule that the cost of major home repairs isn’t recouped in the sales price.
Trap: Telling prospective buyers that you’ll reduce the price of the house because the roof needs repairing.
Result: They nearly always demand a reduction that exceeds the cost of a new roof.
Solution: Even if the cost seems high, make whatever roof repairs are necessary before putting the house on the market. In my experience, a new roof adds slightly more to the house’s market value than the cost of the roof itself.
Bottom Line/Retirement interviewed Mark Nash, a real estate broker with Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in Evanston, Illinois (www.marknashrealtor.com). He is author of 1001 Tips for Buying and Selling a Home (South-Western Educational) and a frequent guest on CBS’s The Early Show and Dow Jones MarketWatch.
(Article originally published August 2007)
Reprinted with the permission of:
Boardroom Inc. and Bottom Line Publications, Inc.
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