Deals That Make Sense

One of the questions I am asked most frequently when invited to a prospective seller’s home is, “Can you think of anything I could do that will make my home sell for more money?” A very good question indeed and if it isn’t asked I begin to worry, for the presentation of the home to a potential buyer is so important in establishing value and desirability in the buyer’s mind. In my view it can make all the difference between making a quick sale for Top Dollar and let’s face it, once you have decided to sell your home no one wants the sale to take a long time nor do they want to sell it for less than they could have achieved.

I was invited over to a potential client’s home and here it is what I was presented with. Gerry and Maria had out-grown their 2 bedroom townhome as their 2 children, a boy and a girl had reached the age where it was no longer convenient for them to be sharing a bedroom. They both worked, Maria full-time and Gerry at 3 different jobs. Working these types of hours and raising 2 children at the same time obviously didn’t leave a great deal of time attend to their home as they would have liked to.

Over a period of time Gerry and Maria had acquired too many things and the house looked cluttered, and quite frankly, it was a mess. There had been no updates or painting done since they had moved in 4 years before.

They were looking at moving up to a detached home and the amount of equity that they came out of the deal with was tremendously important as this would dictate how much they could afford to spend on their new home. Money was going to be tight so we needed to maximize return as much as possible.

The redeeming feature of the home was that it had beautiful hardwood floors that had been redone recently. Here’s what I suggested. Let me handle a renovation project before we put your home on the market and I guarantee we’ll get a much better price for your home. They agreed. I estimated $2,500 to $3,000 would cover the job.

Here’s what we did. We repainted the entire home except for the ceilings using contemporary colours that would bring out the best in the hardwood floors; replaced the light fixtures, electrical switches and the doors in the hallway closets, the bathroom and the 2 bedrooms. The kitchen cabinets were in good shape so we painted those as well with high gloss white paint and replaced the knobs with new ones. Boxes upon boxes of clutter were removed until we had a minimalist effect and really showed the space to its greatest potential. The job cost $3,500 and took a little over 1 week.

Check out the before and after pictures below:

Before:	After:

The result: We sold the unit in less than 23 days for a whopping $252,000 whereas the highest price a similar unit had been sold for was $225,000 a few months earlier. On the day before we sold our unit another unit very similar to ours with lots of updates sold for $237,000. There were 2 other units for sale at the same time our sold. 1 is still for sale at $245,000 and it is 73 days later and the other has cancelled their listing giving up on the sale.

Summary: When you consider selling your home call in a professional realtor that can give you good advice on how to maximize your return in the least amount of time. It will make a very big difference.