How to Prepare Your Home for Sale in the "It" City
In 2013, The New York Times dubbed Nashville, Tennessee the “It” city. And while plenty has changed in the eight years since that proclamation, Nashville remains a hotspot for tourists, artists, entrepreneurs, and those simply looking for an exciting and relatively affordable place to live. If you live in or near Nashville, TN already, then consider yourself lucky. Still, the time may come when you decide to move out of your Nashville home, whether that means simply moving a few miles away or leaving Music City altogether. Whatever the case may be, there’s bound to be interested buyers once you’ve made the decision to sell. If you want to capitalize on your home sale to the highest degree, however, there are important preparations you must make beforehand. Here are some ways to prepare your home for sale in the “It” city.
How to Prepare to Sell a House in Nashville
Understand What Buyers Are Looking For
No matter where you live, you must put yourself in the buyer’s shoes before putting your home up for sale. This should be easy in some ways, since you’ll be in a similar position when finding a new home too. Beyond the obvious attributes (e.g., cleanliness, structural integrity, curb appeal, etc.), consider what a buyer moving to Nashville, TN might want or expect from a property. You might adjust your interior decor to more strongly match the city’s aesthetic or shift around the layout of certain rooms to open them up and make your home look more spacious. Also, come prepared with little facts and tidbits about your home’s location (e.g., how far it is from the city or a certain attraction) and history (if applicable) to further entice potential buyers. Remember: you’re not just selling a house but rather the idea of a home and all that it entails. Read our blog, “5 Questions Every Homebuyer Needs to Ask a Seller,” for more insights into what a buyer might be thinking about as they consider your home.
Clean and Declutter Your Home
After you’ve prepared yourself and your home for the bigger picture conversations, it’s time to get down to the nitty gritty. For starters, get rid of the stuff that’s cluttering up your home. You might give away certain items to those in need or set up a yard sale to help you declutter and raise a little bit of cash while you’re at it. Of course, you don’t have to sell, donate, or throw away everything that’s taking up space; consider renting a storage unit to house items you plan on bringing to your new home when the time comes. No matter how you approach the decluttering process, the main objective is to organize your home and return it to a less personalized form so potential buyers can imagine themselves and their own stuff inside the property.
After you’ve cleared up and organized your home, you’ll want to thoroughly clean its interior and exterior surfaces. Don’t leave any stone unturned in this pursuit, either -- move furniture to access floors and walls that haven’t received attention in years, then dust and scrub every surface inside your home. Consider hiring home power washing professionals to blast away dust, dirt, debris, and grime from your home’s exterior surfaces (doing this yourself may damage your property or cause injury). A sparkling clean exterior is bound to attract more potential buyers, and an equally clean interior will only help seal the deal.
Take Care of Key Repairs
When selling a home, the question of renovations and repairs can be a tricky one. Depending on relevant regulations, the current owner will be responsible for some but not all inspections and repairs. That said, it’s sometimes more practical for the current owner to invest in repairs, even if they’re not required to do so. In a buyer’s market, for instance, fixing up your home ahead of time can be crucial to securing a sale. Examine your entire home inside and out for signs of damage and consider which renovations will enhance your property’s market value and appeal. For instance, you might patch up your siding and drywall, repair and refinish your deck, repair or replace your trim, and so on.
Maximize Your Home’s Curb Appeal
Repairing and renovating your home isn’t just about making it more secure -- it’s also about enhancing aesthetics. When someone is interested in your home, the first thing they’ll encounter is the way the house exterior looks from the curb (i.e., its “curb appeal”). While curb appeal isn’t everything, it is a major indicator of your property’s value and level of demand. So if you’re trying to get the most out of your Nashville home sale, it pays to pay attention to your home’s outward appearance. Not only should you take care of some of those repairs mentioned above, but also consider applying a new coat of exterior paint, refreshing your landscape, replacing outdoor light fixtures, and decorating your exterior in a modern, elegant way. Hiring experts to refinish your door is another way to maximize curb appeal, as your front entry door acts as the focal point of your home’s exterior.
Modernize and Enhance Your Interior Spaces
While a beautiful exterior can draw potential buyers to your home, you’ll have a hard time completing the sale if your home’s interior isn’t also in prime condition. The cleaning, decluttering, and organizing mentioned earlier are important starting points, but there’s more work to do if you wish to modernize your home. If, for instance, your rooms are painted in outdated colors and/or deteriorating paint, consider hiring residential interior painting experts to refresh your surfaces with colors that appeal to a wider audience. As you work on updating your home’s interior, keep in mind that certain rooms carry more weight than others for potential buyers. Kitchens, for instance, consistently rank among the most important rooms for making or breaking a home sale. Updating your kitchen appliances, decor, walls, and/or cabinets can make a huge difference. If you’re concerned about the cost to strip and paint kitchen cabinets, keep in mind that this project can yield a high return on investment (ROI) and increase your home’s value significantly. That said, the project might not be worth completing if you’re ready to sell your home right now -- you want to find a balance between what you can afford in the short term and whether it may benefit you in the long run.
Making Your Home Worth It for New Buyers
Nashville, Franklin, and Brentwood, TN are filled with gorgeous homes, and more and more people are looking to live in or near the “It” city these days. In some ways, then, you might have an easy time selling your Nashville property. Still, you want to get the most out of your home sale, and Nash Painting can help you do just that. Our goal is to leave your home looking like something out of a real estate magazine through our top-quality painting, power washing, repair, and refinishing services. To learn more about us, our services, and our values, call us at 615-829-6858 today!