Selling Your Home in Charleston Area’s Fall Sales Season

Springtime is correctly known near and far as the peak season for selling your home—in Charleston, SC; elsewhere in the U.S.; probably on Mars, too. Everybody knows it. This has created a most unfortunate side effect: namely, the notion that if you missed the spring home sales binge, you’d best cancel all plans and hold your house off the market until next year (even if you’re actually ready to list).

So…should you give up on selling your home in Charleston, SC as we move into the cooler months?

Far from it! In fact, many agents with years of experience under their belts have done the math and consider autumn to be the second best season to sell a home. When you think about it, it’s logical. For one thing, there certainly are prospects who won’t wait—buyers who will be happily mowing their new lawns by the time next spring rolls around. Weather is another reason: fall brings many moderate, perfect-for-home-touring days. Then there’s the calendar itself, providing extra motivation to buy (e.g., everyone who wants to be in their new home before the holidays, or who needs to complete the sale in tax year 2014).

For those who aren’t falling for the wait-until-spring notion, here are a few tips that will help you spruce up your Charleston area property for the fall sales market:

First off, make sure all of the personal summertime clutter—the kids’ camp gear, pool floats, the by-now thoroughly bent croquet wickets—are out of sight. Put the yard into tip-top condition with grass cut, shrubbery tamed, and lawn raked. You should be able to step out the back door and view an uncluttered vista. As always, the object is to enable anyone who visits to readily visualize their own family’s stuff in the cleared outdoor space.

Shorter days means waning natural light, so selling your Charlestonarea home in autumn requires a little extra attention to lighting touches. To guarantee the home looks its best even in late afternoon, open the draperies, blinds, and shutters, and make sure lights and lamps are all turned on. Outside, anywhere the summer’s growing season has resulted in plantings that have overgrown windows, now is the time to trim them—it’s always amazing how less than an hour of snipping can brighten up a home’s interior. You may also consider adding some lighting along walkways, or a well-placed floodlight over the driveway. As we move deeper toward winter, those features will give a subtle boost to after-workday early evening showings.

You don’t have to have hired a professional stager to take advantage of the positive seasonal touches that go with the advent of autumn. Colorful mums, warm-hued candles, pumpkins (or just about any harvest-themed table décor items)—all are familiar details that have the predictable effect of helping people feel more at home. A few well-placed accents don’t take nearly as much effort as some other aspects of selling your Charleston home, but taken together, all contribute to a welcoming presentation.

Where is the nearest pumpkin patch? Where are the closest autumn-themed school or community festivities? Selling a home in fall can benefit when you leave some material about our local seasonal activities in the entryway. Sometimes the charm of a neighborhood winds up being the deciding factor for a waffling prospective buyer.

If you’ve been undecided about whether selling your home now—or waiting until next spring—is the best course of action, why not contact me today for a preliminary walk-through and pricing evaluation. I think we can put together a plan in action to get your home sold for top dollar sooner rather than later!

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