PREPARING YOUR HOME FOR DISPLAY

When your home is up for sale, it's like having your boss and your relatives and your worst enemy over for dinner, all at the same time. The scrutiny is intense. Martha Webb, author of Dress Your House for Success, recommends going out and looking at sale homes yourself to get an understanding of “how critical a buyer gets when looking. Begin to get a sense of what it's like when a house is completely clean and there isn't any work to be done.” Then bring that objectivity back to your own home.

 

Webb suggests a five-step approach to bringing your house up to snuff. The first three basics are cleaning, uncluttering, and repairing. Don't stint on anything that will make the house look better.

 

The final two steps, which Webb calls neutralizing and dynamizing, help to create a feeling of home -- something buyers will remember “long after they've been in the house.”

 

Neutralizing involves creating an environment that will appeal to a broad range of people. This can mean anything from using neutral colors when repainting to removing highly personal items such as religious artifacts to eliminating pet or cooking odors.

Dynamizing involves looking at every room in your house and thinking about how to convey a special message about that space. In a den, for instance, you might drape an afghan over an easy chair and arrange a reading lamp next to it.

 

DISCLOSING DEFECTS
Admitting that your house isn't perfect can be one of the most anxiety-producing aspects of selling it. When it comes to serious flaws, however, telling all is not only the best policy; in many states it's the law: you must tell the buyer the truth about all physical defects of the house. Indeed most states also require sellers to sign either disclosure forms listing any known defects, or disclaimers affirming their lack of knowledge of any defects in the condition of the house.

In recent years, more and more buyers have sued sellers for not disclosing certain problems, or being outright deceitful about defects, before the sale. In these situations, the courts have increasingly sided with the buyers. Because agents have been sued with the sellers in some instances, some agents will no longer show a home unless the seller has completed a disclosure form.

Most states require sellers to tell buyers if there is any lead-based paint in or around the property and to report the presence of such environmental concerns as radon or asbestos. But, like most real estate laws, whether and how you're required to disclose the truth about other defects or structural problems, such as a wet basement, patched roof, or cracked foundation, may vary somewhat from state to state. So whether you're selling your home yourself or through a real estate agent, it's critical that you understand and abide by whatever disclosure laws apply in your case. Local consumer affairs offices can give you information on the specifics of your state's requirements, and the necessary forms are usually available in any real estate office.

As a seller, be aware that the frequency of home inspections in real estate transactions offers protection to buyers above and beyond state disclosure laws. A professional home inspection is likely to reveal the deepest, darkest secrets of your home. One possible strategy is to hire the inspector yourself and to repair any structural or systems' problems found before putting your house on the market.