Selling Our Old House

I'll start with a little history.  Brian bought our old house a couple of months before we met.  He chose to buy a house rather than a car as he figured it would make him more marketable to women.  Smart Guy!  We came home to that house after we married and brought two beautiful babies home to that house.  A lot of great memories...

After we had Olivia, our cozy little house started feeling a little too cozy.  For a long time, there had been a handful of little things that we didn't really love about our house, but we were good with staying.  At some point last year, that changed for us and it just became very apparent that a move was in our future.  We had eliminated the rarely used guest room to turn it into Naomi's room.  Then, determined to not disrupt sleep habits, we moved our office into our bedroom to convert that room into Olivia's room.  Then Brian's job became a primarily work from home job; a huge blessing, but bringing our need for a little more space to the forefront.

So, throughout last year we began preparing ourselves.  First, we began saving like crazy.  We had about 2/3 of the inside of the house repainted (a long overdue thing, as in I'd been talking about it since we first married).  Then we had our real estate agent over for a very preliminary walk through of our house.  We discussed the price point for our house, how it would be marketed, and the process in general.  We discussed other obvious cosmetic touch ups and decluttering activities that would help our house sell.  And in the following months, we busted rump to get it all done.  The decluttering was obviously the hardest part. I wish that I had taken some before and after pictures as the change was dramatic, but suffice to say people were astonished and also wondering where all the toys went (more on that later). 

But, what really kicked the process off was finding the perfect house and putting a non-contingent contract on it. By the time our agent came to do a staging walk through to prep for the photographer, we only had to move a couple more pieces of furniture out to the garage and re-arrange things.  I was very pleased to get lots of compliments on how well we did getting the place ready on our own.  

Our house was only on the market for a couple of days when we got an offer.  We accepted the offer with a couple of changes to the contract, but I never had a good feeling about it.  Without going into too much detail, I just didn't feel that the buyer had the money to really make the deal go through.  Whether that was the case or it was something else, I'll never really know, but the deal fell through during the offer period.  

Our house went back on the market and again within days, we had another offer.  This one was a much more solid offer.  The inspection turned up hail damage on the roof (can't say that I'd been up there, well ever really) to the extent that we had to replace the roof prior to the sale.  Fortunately we were able to file it under our insurance and only had to pay our deductible but it was a bit of a hit to the bottomline of our home sale - bummer, but nothing we really could have done anything about. 

Everything closed on time.  Whew!  On October 30th, the movers came and by the 31st we were officially out of the house in which our little family had formed and grown. 

Home Sale Tips 

1. Get a good agent!  Even Dave Ramsey (click here) doesn't support saving a buck in this area and I'll tell you a handful of reasons why not. 
• This is a stressful enough process without an expert in your corner.  I think mine had to talk me down from the crazy ledge several times. 
• They know how to price your house to maximize traffic and profits at the same time.  It is possible to both over and under price your property.  Your agent can help you find that sweet spot.  
• Marketing, marketing, marketing...
• Contracts - your agent can make sure that yours works for you.  
• Staging and professional photos - our agent did both and if yours doesn't, consider a different agent.  
2. Prep your house!  Take a good objective look at your house.  Are there any obvious repairs that clearly need to be made.  A potential buyer will either be completely turned off or will be just adding up the dollar signs as they walk around.  Plus, chances are pretty good that they'll just end up asking for these repairs in a contract addendum following the inspection anyway.  
3. Staging - you do not live in a house the same way that you stage it.  Our agent made a point of saying this to us and it definitely holds true.  You will put furniture in your garage and you will pre-pack things that you don't use as often.  Be prepared to feel a little like a guest in your own home.  This also helps the detachment process so that you're not so sad when it's time to go. 
4. Deep Clean!  My vote, spend the money and hire someone to do a good deep clean of your house the week before you put it on the market.  If you've got pets and carpet, plan for carpet cleaning too. 
5. Speaking of pets, you don't want your buyer talking about your pets.  In most cases, simply keeping it clean and smell free is sufficient, but it really is ideal to just not have your pet there during the process.  When Brian's brother was selling his house, his dogs stayed at our house.  When we sold ours, our cats stayed at my cousins house.  We took them over the same day we had our carpets cleaned.  No dog poo in the yard and no stinky litterboxes.  
6. If you've got small kids, it's a little extra challenging.  Schedules will be messed up.  Keep emergency rations (diapers, snacks, travel potty seat, etc) and entertainment in the car or near the door for quick exits.  And, really scale down the toys.  Be prepared to wrestle your kids on the clean floor like never before.  Can you say, "Tickle Tackle!"  Enlist nearby friends'/families' houses, libraries, parks, playscapes, etc for a place to camp out during showings. 
7. Be prepared to gain weight.  Okay, so with proper planning, this isn't necessary, but most likely you will eat out more than you normally do throughout the process and weight gain does happen.  (Hello 5 lbs, I remember losing you earlier this year, bummed out that we've met again.)
8. Make sure that you have extra money set aside for closing costs and any repairs that may come up during inspection.  If you don't end up using it, then you've got a decorating budget in your new home.  But, if you do need it, you'll be so glad to have it.  
9. And, lastly, keep your eye on the prize.  I say this because "have fun!" wasn't really an appropriate sentiment.  You just need to keep the end in mind and keep marching forward.