When getting ready to put your house on the market there are some fundamental things you must know. First, you must understand that your personal taste in
furnishings, decorating, and landscaping is lousy. Beyond lousy. Your taste
stinks. And no one will ever want to purchase your home if it furnished,
decorated, or landscaped with your personal touch. No, you must clear out all
evidence that real live human beings actually live in your home, and pretend
you are furnishing your home for an upscale hotel chain. Then, and only then,
will you be able to find a buyer for your property.
Obviously you will need to hire experts to do this work for
you. The first item on the agenda should be to hire a stager. A stager is a
person whose job it is to walk around other people’s houses and criticize their
furnishings, decorations and landscaping. If he succeeds in convincing you that
you need his services, you will need to hire a large storage unit and a moving
van. After you move out all your personal belongings, the stager can set your
house up properly (so it looks like an upscale hotel chain).
Your realtor might also recommend a landscaping crew. Their
job is to come in and weed, prune, and/or destroy the yard you have lovingly
cultivated over the years. If you are lucky, you will end up with a yard that
looks like something from a gardening magazine. If you are not, you will
have a bunch of mutilated shrubs, bushes and trees that resemble overgrown
Hobbits.
A cleaning crew is an indispensable part of this process.
You must hire cleaners to mop the floors, clean the windows, scrub your
baseboards, and get into all the nooks and
crannies that you haven’t touched in the past twenty years (or since you purchased the house). After the cleaning crew leaves, you will be
expected to keep the house looking this nice. This means that every morning
and/or evening you will need to vacuum, scrub counters, clean toilets, etc. If
you have a full-time job, this will prove to be impossible. Your realtor will
therefore want you to hire the cleaning crew to come back on a weekly basis until
the house sells.
Another important thing to remember is that pets are
forbidden. Remember, most upscale hotel chains do not allow pets. If you have a
pet, your realtor will encourage you to board said pet until the house sells.
If this is not possible, you will need to remove all evidence that the pet
exists. When you show the home, you will need to hide your pet’s food and
water, bed, toys, blankets, and any other evidence that might indicate a
four-legged creature lives in your abode. And of course, you must remove the
pet from the property when potential buyers come to visit!
People who live in upscale hotel chains do not read books or
newspapers, use toiletry products, eat, or have guests over. Therefore, neither
will you. At least, not in your house, until it sells.
Now that you are living in an antiseptic
hotel-room-sort-of-house, it is time to ask yourself the all important
question: Why exactly are we moving? Maybe, just maybe, the best
strategy is to stay right where you are.
