How To Prepare Your House for Sale.

If you didn't get your house ready in time for the the hot seller's market over the past few years you definitely missed out on those historical high prices and bidding war galore! Although the housing market has cooled down all over the country Austin, Texas is still a pretty sought after place to be. In some seller's markets, you can sell a home in lived-in condition without much complaint. But in normal markets or a buyer's market, repairs can make or break a sale.

This is a great time to bring in a realtor to help you figure out if renovations are a good idea to bring your house up to par with the neighborhood or whether you're better off selling the home as is, potentially at a slightly lower price point. Often, home upgrades don't provide a good return on investment, and potential buyers may prefer to pay less for the home and fix it up the way they want, rather than buy a newly renovated property that's not to their taste.

A real estate agent will help you find a good price for you home, but one good place to start is by looking at comparable homes in your neighborhood that have sold recently. You can also look at homes that are currently for sale and see what their asking prices are per square foot. Typically May is the month that brings the best premium for home sellers, followed by June, July, and April. Here in Austin spring is the best time to list your property.

House Jefe Staging Tips & Advice

1. Know your audience.

If you’re not sure about your audience, do some research on your farm area. Who lives there? What do they value?

2. Curb Appeal

Invest in getting your property pressure washed. Paint the front door and/or shutters a bright color, but make sure it coordinates well with the rest of the home’s colors.

Clean up the edging around flowerbeds and lay down fresh mulch. Fill in empty beds with small shrubs, seasonal flowers, and greenery.

Add a couple of chairs to your porch to expand your outdoor living space. Don’t forget to stage outdoor spaces like patios, backyards, or balconies.

3. Update Kitchen

Give cabinets a facelift with paint; go for classic white or try a dark neutral like gray or slate blue. Show off your storage.

Change any outdated hardware. Swap out faucet for one with style and added function.

Update backsplash – (Peel and stick options if you don’t want to spend a lot of money.)

4. Improve Traffic Patterns

Space plan furniture, declutter to make space feel bigger. Make sure one piece of furniture does not dominate the space.

5. Add Functional Spaces

Ex: Office space. These days more people are working from home and homeschooling is becoming a common thing, so a workspace may be essential for your potential buyers.

If you truly want to help your buyers imagine themselves in the space, you can stage rooms for one purpose and then have them virtually staged for another. This way you can show a fully realized image of the room serving a single purpose.

Dining and living room are the areas that significantly impact buyers' decisions. Select a few pieces there for décor to stand out.

No empty beds. Air mattresses are incredibly inexpensive these days, so there is simply no excuse for an empty bed frame. While quality linens can be expensive, they might be a worthwhile investment.

Create inclusive children’s bedrooms that reflect the style of the rest of the home.

Create an inviting and serene primary bedroom with a well-made bed covered in luxurious linens. Declutter nightstands.

6. Depersonalize

Remove family photos, your kids’ artwork, framed diplomas, and personal collections. Eliminate signs of pets, put the beds dishes and toys away.

7. Deep Clean Bathrooms & Glass Windows

Polish faucets, clean up mold, new shower curtain and mats add candles and fluffy white towels. Add pleasant aromas throughout the space.

8. Amp Up the Lighting

One of the things that make staged homes look so warm and welcoming is great lighting. Increase the wattage in your lamps and fixtures. Aim for a total of 100 watts for every 50 square feet. Don't depend on just one or two light fixtures per room, either. Make sure you have three types of lighting: ambient (general or overhead), task (pendant, under-cabinet or reading) and accent (table and wall).

9. Get rid of Outdated Window Treatments

Use curtains to fool the eye. Hung the right way, window treatments can help make a room look more spacious. Use drapes that are the same color as your walls so that the continuous hue will make the space look wider. Create the illusion of height by hanging drapes above the window. They should start at the ceiling and just barely brush the floor. Don’t let them gather or puddle on the floor.

10. Update Accessories, Area Rugs and Décor

No fake plants or food. Keep your table and countertops minimal and decorative. Instead of going for the bold and the beautiful area rugs, stick to the subdued and understated. A nice neutral sisal or even a gray or white shag will do the trick.

Remember

When showing your home, or working with a real estate agent, be sure to carefully list everything that is original to the space and what has been updated. Buyers may want to know whether the stove is original or just a great retro replica, and they might be curious to know if certain furnishings were original to the property. Also look into possibly creating a virtual tour of your newly staged home.

Staging is quick, and it showcases the home. You want to create a lifestyle people will be excited for.