Selling Your Home — Assuming Success is the Way to Go!

If you’re thinking of selling your home in Charleston, SC this summer, you’ll want to fetch top dollar for your efforts. Preparing the property is a given, of course, but savvy home sellers often share another kind of preparation. They prepare themselves by adopting the attitude shared by legions of successful salespeople—they assume that success is inevitable. They think and act positively.

The essence of the kind of positive attitude that will make selling your Charleston home a pleasure can be boiled down to the simple assumption that it really is going to sell—and sooner rather than later! When you proceed from that assumption, it follows that your buyer’s home inspection will soon be at hand. Since that’s a lead pipe cinch, get ahead of the game by making all repairs that a keen-eyed inspector will report. It means fixing problems that range from misbehaving light switches all the way to seriously outdated furnaces.

The more items that a home inspector finds, the more bargaining leverage it puts in the hands of the buyer. You can perform your own DIY inspection, or even better, order a professional inspection to identify issues you might miss that could become deal-killers.

A positive attitude toward selling your home will energize your efforts to create an experience that encourages buyers to see their own family happily ensconced there. Cleaning—truly deep cleaning—is the first step, with de-cluttering the next. When you create more-empty-than-not living spaces, it helps your buyers imagine their own furnishings in the picture. Their tastes could be anything, so the emptier the ‘canvas,’ the more likely to please.

That’s why most real estate experts agree that a prime tactic for selling your home is to remove personal belongings like family photos and souvenirs. In other words, selling your Charleston area home gets on track when you actively remove the your from “selling your home.” As Tracy Hoth, host of the radio show Clutter Interrupted, says of prospective buyers: “Do you really want to see pictures of the people who have brushed their teeth and spit in the same sink you would be using?” That may be an indelicate way to put it—but the point is dead-on.

Once your house is clean (possibly feeling a little bit empty at this point), a final touch or two can finish your preparation. Staging can be a decisive differentiator in selling your home. Simple suggestions include setting the dining room table; putting out seasonal fruit on the kitchen counter with a knife lying nearby; or setting up the living room to suggest the family’s movie night is ready to enjoy. The idea is to add subtle features to a home’s decor to make buyers feel like they already belong.

Parlaying your positive attitude with these straightforward steps needs only the addition of an experienced real estate agent to your team to make selling your Charleston, SC home close to inevitable.

Interested in selling your Charleston area home? Visit: www.jeffcookrealestate.com

Interested in buying a Charleston area home? Visit: www.discovercharlestonareahomes.com

-Jeff Cook

Jeff Cook Real Estate

Charleston, SC