Tips for selling your home

If you are in the market to relocate and sell your home, take note of these suggestions.

Many of us Silver Lifers consider selling the home we have and either relocating to a different part of the country or just reducing the size of our homes to a more manageable square footage.

If you are doing this consider the following tips that Marcie Geffner of Bankrate.com has compiled.

Get your pets out of the house
No matter how much you love Fido or Tweety or Felix, potential buyers may not agree with you and even find their presence a clear reason to turn down the house before they get much past the entrance.  Pets can cause allergies for others and they often have an odor to which you are oblivious, but is terribly off-putting to strangers.  Find a pet boarding service and put your pets there for the day and clean and deodorize the house as well as hide their food bowls, litter boxes, play toys and whatever else they use before showing it and prior to the open houses your realtor will be conducting.

Remove personal items
It may seem pretty obvious, but if your décor includes political statements like those favoring one party or another, or a stance on a particularly sensitive issue like abortion, gay rights or the like, get rid of them as they could well be offensive to prospective buyers.

Maybe you have a collection of World War II memorabilia that contains Nazi souvenirs that a relative brought back from his campaign in Europe, or you might be a civil war buff that collects Confederate flags and other items.  If you have anything like that, put them in storage.

In some cases people may even be put off by displays of your favorite sports team, especially if the display is overdone, or contains negative items of your team’s biggest rival.

Along those lines, if you are a hunter and display your trophies and guns, know that many folks may find that reason enough to stop touring the house and move on to the next one on the list.

Other items of décor that you may value could also be a deal killer.  What does your art collection look like?  Do you have paintings of nudes on the wall?  Are there sexually suggestive or explicit wall hangings in the bedrooms?  Do you display violent artworks or posters?  Some things that you find suits your taste and idea of home décor can be offensive to prospective purchasers.

Remove evidence of smoking
What should also be obvious, but apparently is not, is that if you indulge in the personal use of marijuana or other recreational drugs, put the paraphernalia away where it can’t be seen. No matter what the laws are in your state, many folks still find the use of recreational drugs a definite red flag.

Likewise if you smoke in your home, there may be little you can do to overcome the years of smoke residue on surfaces and the odor permeating the air.  Just be aware that non-smokers will find this a definite deal killer and will seldom enter a home that smells of smoke. Perhaps retain the services of a commercial cleaning service to ameliorate the effects of smoking on your furniture, carpets, and other surfaces.

These are just a few of the tips that you can find for yourself with a very quick search on line.  The best thing you can do is consult a realtor and ask him or her to have a close look at your home inside and out and make candid suggestions about what to do to enhance the attractiveness of your home.

I should caution you that some realtors may be reticent to do so, as many home owners may take offense at the suggestions and retain the services of a realtor that merely tells them what they want to hear, namely that their display of offensive items is “unique”, “personal”, “tells a story” or anything else aimed at getting a listing.