This post addresses that age old question that all homeowners wanting to sell their home ask themselves… and that is,

“Should I fix up, or make some serious improvements to my house before I sell it?”

And the answer is a resounding “Yes!”

Unless of course you are prepared to take the hit in your asking price. The truth of the matter is that whatever you “invest” in improvements to your home will give you 3-4 times return on the money that you spend in doing it.

As an example, last month I had a homeowner needing to relocate to the east coast before the end of the year (so, this wasn’t a quick “I need to move next month” situation) and aftering walking me through the home and asking for my opinion as to what he thinks he can get for it, I made several, what I thought were rather mild and obvious, suggestions to be able to increase his asking price. Things such as, changing the carpet on the upper floor because the kids had run it too thin and it had some stains, repainting a couple of rooms and I suggested some more complementary colors than were currently there, and drastically improving his backyard which he had not taken care of at all and was in dire need of pruning (possibly taking out a couple of trees, as well) and landscaping. Here he had a space that could have really been a lovely garden setting with great sun exposure and plenty of romping space for the kids, a nice backyard BBQ party space or even a small vegetable or flower garden. But he had done nothing with it and left it overgrown for years.

Anyway, suffice it to say that he didn’t want to make any of these changes which probably would have cost him about $5,000-$8,000. So, we listed the house and he received $30,000 less than his asking price because the new owner commented on all of “improvements” that I had suggested and that they were now going to have to make. And thinking like someone who is buying a house, their imaginations of what improvements they want to make are always going to be bigger and more expensive than the improvements that you, the original seller, could have made at least getting them in the ballpark of your asking price. If you allow people to envision “grandly”, they will be deducting that “grand” price off of their offer in order to buy the house in question.

Bottom line is that if you are a seller and you have the time and the small investment funds to make the improvements necessary to bring a buyer to the table for your asking price, then definitely do it! It will pay off in spades! And if you are a buyer, take note because you have every right to look for these small improvements as a bargaining chip in lowering the asking price and getting a home that you would love, and can now “remodel” the way YOU want to do it and not have to accept the changes that the previous owner decided to make (i.e, paint color, carpet color, tree removal, etc)…

Hope this helps both sides!

Until next post…

Tracey

p.s. Don’t forget to check out the Venice Art Walk and Silent Auction this weekend, it is going to be amazing! You can get all of the information you need here… hopefully they’re not sold out yet!

p.s.s.  Don’t forget to head over and check out my website and all the new listings at Santa Monica Real Estate

Have a great week!