I went out looking at houses for the 1st time the other day and was amazed at the shape of some of the homes. We're looking in the $200,000 to $400,000 price range in towns a step above ours.

I saw a 10 year old house that had black scum in the shower, the house looked neglected on the inside while the out was pretty decent. Another was so packed in boxes we couldn't walk and decided to leave when we came across a pet smell. So far none of the houses we "it" but I did see one that could be..

We've been doing a lot, more then I thought we would due to me being down for the last few years. I was going to spot paint but ended up repainting 5 rooms so far, a 6th will follow.

Our master bedroom remodel is taking much longer then we thought. All new sheetrock, & the bath was made bigger by taking from the huge closet, it now has a linen closet, which was needed. I took drapes down from the mud-room, what a difference with the light. Haven't decided if I'll put a sheer scarf up yet. Also working in the garden, right now I'm taking a break from digging a weeping redbud, I will plant a Japanese Maple in it's place.

This is all BEFORE we'll go on a cleaning sweep and clean top to bottom. Windows, baseboards, ceiling fans, etc.

We thought we'd have it ready by Wednesday. HA!!!!!

I was glad to get input. She's never been in the house so she saw it for the 1st time. She liked that the rooms were neutral colors. She was impressed with all of the room sizes and since she just finished looking in the area, she said it was in better shape then what was out there :)

I'm not going to stress about grass because we do have mostly grass while the neighbors don't. Very hard to grow grass in sugar sand if you don't know what you are doing.

We also moved almost everything from the attic plus some furniture, it filled a storage shed. I have a few more pieces to put in, then what's left of decluttering will go in the attic. I collect dolls and have tons of bins with Barbies I hope to ebay one day.

Reno, I think I'd die. My back hurts a lot as it is, just reading what you're doing made it hurt more lol

Me- I did everything conceivable. I knew that selling in a South Florida market would be an uphill battle and I did not want our house to languish on the market because of any failure on my part. So I painted, I planted, I refurbished, I improved, I stored, and I staged. And I sold in 30 days.

I was an extremely motivated seller and did every single thing in my power to increase my chances. In our market there were something like 80 homes for sale for every buyer so I had to do everything possible to stand out from the crowd. Your area and motivation will of course be different.

*Paint in almost the entire interior: walls in 5 rooms, ceilings and trim in all except master suite. Also exterior doors and touchups on exterior trim. Had to hire a pro to get it all done, and it took HIM nearly a month. :-(
*New lighting and ceiling fans throughout first floor and exterior to replace peeling, corroded, and garish-to-begin-with "builder brass". I had bought the outside lights some months back so this was not an added expense. Moved a couple of other light fixtures around. Replaced some outlets and switches that didn't work.
*New kitchen flooring, cabinet hardware, sink and faucet. New range hood to go with the stove we bought ourselves in December. Had to hold off on counters for now, we ran out of cash as the painter went over budget.
*New hardware, mirror and curtain in powder room.
*New doorknobs and hinges entire first floor... I just found out today that I need a new door knob for the basement door because I lost the key to the old one *sheepish grin* Getting a locksmith out to rekey it will cost more than just replacing the knob, which will take about 10 minutes.
*Mostly refurbished the upstairs bath with new flooring, painted cabinets, cabinet and door hardware, light fixture, installed vent fan (there was no ventilation before), towel bars etc., cultured marble vanity top with integrated sinks (perfectly appropriate for this modest house) and staged with new shower curtain, countertop accessories, & towels (all bought dirt cheap on clearance at Target). Toilet was new last year. Really wish we could have replaced the icky Barbie-skin-beige tub but just couldn't afford it, so it's going to hide behind a shower curtain.
*New cordless pleated shades in all the upstairs bedrooms and bath - they make up the "children's zone" of the house so I chose with an eye to child safety (50% off at JCPenney!)
*Having 14yo builder carpeting we can't afford to replace steam cleaned a few days before D-day
*New window screens for about half the windows
*Reseeded the lawn, cut up and got rid of stormfallen trees, pulled a LOT of weeds and Roundupped a patch of poison ivy, and pruned the shrubbery. (Rachelrachel, there's a lawn patch product we love that is a combination of a cellulose mulch, fertilizer, and grass seed - Scotts Patchmaster is one brand but there are a few others. You just spread it out, water it in, and ignore it. We have used it on several problem areas with excellent results, and we're both black-thumbed wonders! It germinates fast too.) I sacrificed a pair of jeans to the gods of houseselling, I caught them on a branch and ripped the butt out! LOL
*My mom is coming down Monday for two days to plant flowers and help me with decluttering, since I'm completely over my head with that!!
*Bunch of small things: Took down the curtains in kitchen, DR and LR to make the rooms look brighter and bigger, moved a bunch of furniture to empty rooms upstairs, put our library back to a dining room, took down all our potentially-controversial artwork (like nudes), put away any religiously oriented books and objects (we're Pagan, which offends some people). Renting a storage unit isn't in the cards but we have one empty bedroom where we can neatly put packed boxes. We also sold some furniture on Craigslist and Freecycled a bit more since we expect to be moving to much smaller digs.

We still need to clean out the basement and garage (next weekend!), declutter and pack excess stuff, take a couple of carloads of stuff to the women's shelter (they use household items to set women up in apartments and also have a thrift store), do general housecleaning (I may hire help for this), and take care of a LOT of minor little things. We are in a BIG hurry to get the bleep out of this house, otherwise we would not have done much past just cleaning.

Rachelrachel, don't feel bad about procrastinating... I am spending endless hours on the MLS site (I signed up with a local REA to get access to a somewhat limited version of the MLS, which has a little more info and usually more pictures than realtor.com and you get street addresses) and realtor.com too. Which is silly because we're not going to start seriously househunting until we have a contract on this house; we cannot risk carrying 2 mortgages and a lot of sellers around here are not accepting offers with sale-of-previous-house contingencies on them. But I can't help it. I am just so darn sick of it all, we have been doing this for over 2 months now and have not had time to see our friends or do anything recreational, it's been house house house house house! By a couple weeks ago I was about ready to just light a match. I hated this house when we bought it (it was a purely practical purchase, the best of a bad selection and still kind of a dump, since we had to move fast) and I'm starting to hate it again. But not so much that I'm going to totally fire-sale it. There are 8 other houses in our price bracket in my small town of 8000, although most of them are 3/2s and ours is a smaller (just under 2000sf) 4/2.5. Two of the bedrooms are pretty small though.

Teresa, talk to your real estate agent about what you can do for curb appeal that doesn't take much oomph or expense. I totally understand because I have health issues too. He/she might know of someone who can do that work cheap, too. (If you were in coastal NH I would be able to recommend a guy who is just starting out with his own business and so is very reasonably priced.) Maybe you can find a neighborhood kid who will mow your lawns and do other chores under your direction? Earlier in my post I recommended a lawn patch product that is very easy to put down and the bags are very lightweight. It's not too horribly expensive, 1 bag is about $5 and covers a 10x10 area.

GOOD LUCK EVERYONE. Our hard work will pay off.

Yeah, I think we'll do okay. *knock on wood* We're pricing it toward the low end to move it and because it has some less-desirable elements (flag lot, steep slope in back, yard's not very big, that kind of thing), and it really is a more modest house than advertisers are training people to want - those granite counters and stainless steel appliances that are practically standard issue in new construction would be like be putting a tutu on a bulldog - but we live in a town with a good school system and we're hoping to attract the folks who want to get their kids into these schools but can't afford most of the houses in town. Most 4 bedroom houses here are wicked expensive (and they do tend to be bigger, more like 3000sf) and "Joe Sixpack" types are priced right out.

I also cleaned cleaned cleaned until I could hardly move... every darned day, because of our 2 large dogs (and its spring shedding time!!). We also repainted all the outside window casings and repainted some hideous pink walls (we bought the house that way!).

I reorganized some of the rooms to look like they'd been used conventionally, when in fact they hadn't. We stopped living in any part of the house that wasn't needed to keep the mess to a minimum.

We didn't do any capitol projects, but our house was in pretty good shape and well maintained to begin with.

Good luck to all :)
GP

I staged rather than re-do all kinds of things. Staging detracts the eye from those little remodels that you really should do. You could do a decent staging for $500.
I'm saying this from experience. I just sold & I staged & painted one room (had to because It was stenciled to death!).

I though about putting in granite, removing wallpaper...and got overwhemled at the thought of removing 4 rooms of wallpaper & ripping out the laminate that ran all the way up under the upper cabintes-yuck. It was way too much money & work. I knew that nobody would pay me more if I had done the above. I just decluttered & staged.

BTW- my favorite selling thread I read was when some guy quickly painted the entire interior of the house.....however, he left all the furniture against the walls in place. Could you imagine after he moved out with that furniture & the new owners opened the doors???

By remodeling it too early, it will no longer be new and thus you cannot use that as a selling feature. And, trends change, so that remodel can quickly be considered dated in just a few years.

I've been here 7 years. In those 7, we've slowly been making improvements. There was paneling in the livingroom (which also had faux brick, wood stove with real brick on the floor), hall, bedroom & master. The master was the last for us, I'd wanted to paint & be done with it, hubby wanted to do it right. Adding the few feet with the new linen closet made a big difference in the master bath. I love the new master bath between the floor we picked, new shower curtain + accessories (spa leaf toothbrush holder, etc) it's one of my favorite remodels that we've done.

The main bath also has paneled walls, if we stayed it was huby's next project although it doesn't bother me because it has a design on it. We would have possibly rearranged where everything went had we taken it on. We just put a new floor in there, what a huge difference, and IMO someone won't mind the paneled walls so much. It also got a new closet door. The wood vanity was repainted, I'd wanted to put a new top on it, but with the paneling, it probably wouldn't be as faded and would look out of place.

With doing the master walls the right way with sheetrock, we have a better chance of getting away with not having to rock the (main) bathroom. Had we painted the paneling, I think it might be a deciding factor for a buyer. So the remodel will be a plus.

The mud / landry room was done a few years ago. It started with a concrete floor, and after raising part of the floor, the washer / dryer is raised so that someone with a bad back like myself doesn't have to bend down. He also put up a shelving system over the W/D giving much needed storage space. The kitchen also got new flooring at that point. Unfortunatly, I'd painted the mud room before the floor went in, so it didn't match. It does now.

Yesterday I finished up the hallway. The attic needed a new access door, so that's been painted as well. I started painting the computer room last night. It went from a smoke color to what I hope is a (light)smoky green. I'm kicking myself for not going to the Depot to have the paint formulated right. I'm not sure if the local hardware store matched it correctly.

BTW- my favorite selling thread I read was when some guy quickly painted the entire interior of the house.....however, he left all the furniture against the walls in place. Could you imagine after he moved out with that furniture & the new owners opened the doors???

The "possible" house I looked at the other day had what looked like fresh painted walls. They started packing and taking shelving down, of course they didn't remove the shelving before they painted lol

We may have been a little anal about all of it, but the feed back we get is wonderful. We have had several open houses and the realtor says she there is hardly any time without someone there. People are coming in and measuring to see if their furniture will fit. some are actually moving our furniture around. We had our first offer within 2 days of listing it. Unfortunately we couldn't come to agreement on terms. We are now 3 weeks on the market and have several other people very interested in it.

We are not priced under the market so it isn't the price driving the interest.

Actually, I can see the point of this, although it wouldn't apply to every buyer. Some buyers are mentally oriented toward new construction even if it is out of their price range or completely unavailable in the particular area. This is why the TV home-staging shows often try to make the house look like a model home - i.e., a house that no one lives in or has ever lived in.

The most noteworthy example I can think of is a bride on House Hunters who looked at the "dated" cabinets in the kitchen (perfectly decent but not in accord with current fashion) and sniffed, "I would never think of my putting my china in her old cabinets."

Now, a person who is repulsed by the thought that someone else has previously used the kitchen cabinets is going to be even more repulsed by the idea that other people have used the bathroom, but is probably too stupid to think of it alone. A part-used roll of toilet paper makes it obvious; a full one makes it feel more like a hotel. (I suppose you should also fold the end into a triangle?)

Well, sure. I'd much rather redo the house to suit myself and be able to enjoy it. When we bought this house in 2004 we had planned on staying here for about 15 years and had had a "5 year plan" for the house. 2005-06 was the master suite, 2007-08 was to be the kitchen, utility/powder room and the downstairs moldings, 2009 was to be the upstairs bath and adjoining office and upstairs moldings, 2010 was to be exterior siding. We didn't get time to do anything more than the master suite, life happened and we have to move, so the kitchen and other baths looked kind of sorry since we had just been waiting for their remodels to come around to do anything to them.

We're not doing any major remodels, just enough spiffing-up to make the house look less worn and tatty. As okmoreh points out, many people are being trained by the media to want new construction even if they can't afford new construction, they don't want to think about anyone having lived in their house before. If the house is 15 years old and LOOKS it, it's less appealing to those folks. (I really don't think most people want to buy a house and immediately embark on remodeling projects, I think that's a small subset of the population.) The sheeple's money is as good as anyone else's AFAIC. In my market I certainly couldn't afford to throw away that herd of walking wallets by having the house clean but tired looking. Like the kitchen floor vinyl was permanently dirty because the surface had worn off (what idiot thought WHITE was a good color for a floor in a room with three outside doors in New England, land of mud and snow and more mud?) and it was gouged and torn in quite a few places. Replacing that did wonders for the kitchen's overall appearance. The cheap stainless steel sink was dented and scratched and would not get clean looking no matter what I did to it - I must have spent $30 on different products - so we got rid of it and its cheap faucet. Replaced both for about $200 total thanks to eBay, and again, a little more "wow" to the kitchen.

Marys100, there's a house that is giving me the shivers that has a newly-remodeled kitchen that is also downright awful in layout, clearly done by someone who had never cooked anything more complex than a frozen pizza. (There's maybe 6 linear feet of workspace. I've worked with kitchens that had less but I'd prefer not to, although I don't need these enormous kitchens the new houses have.) If we bought the house we would have to completely redo it - either pull those brand new cabinets, which are pretty nice, and reinstall them in a more sensible design, or sell them on Craigslist and start from scratch. I would rather they had just left whatever kitchen was there!

My thoughts exactly.

Found this in another post, thought it might be helpful for those of us living by military bases:

militarybyowner.com is a source for advertising your home "For Sale by Owner" or "For Rent" near military installations. Use the power of your military network and the web to help you find, sell or rent your next home

However, the odor of cleaning products is not necessarily welcome, either.

But sometimes it is. I once rented a house that the previous tenant had damaged and left filthy. It was a shambles when I viewed it, but I put down a deposit because the size, layout, and location were all perfect for me. The agent promised that the damage would be repaired and all the walls and ceilings would be painted. I was still concerned because the bathroom was filthy and he hadn't said anything about that.

About two weeks later, the agent told me that the work was not quite finished, but I could start moving things in. I went later that day with a carload, and was delighted to be met at the door by an overwhelming odor of bleach. I found the agent's cleaning woman in the last steps of making the bathroom spotless. I suspect it may have taken most of the day.

Between now and then, besides entertaining two houseguests from June 9th-15th, our punch list is:

Living room:
- bring up coffee table from basement storage room
- box away some books so the shelves aren't overflowing
- recycle massive piles of magazines

Dining room:
- put two dining-room chairs into storage so table doesn't look too crammed

Kitchen:
- massive cleanout of cupboards, tossing old unused kitchen stuff and getting all the clutter on the counters moved into the cabinets.
- get handyman in to change hinges on doors that don't close neatly
- tidy underneath sink
- get plumber in to fix water-flow problem in main sink

Front hall:
- clean out walk-in storage closet and front-hall closet
- swap entryway rug with small bedroom rug, which is thinner and won't jam against the coat-closet door when it is opened

Little bedroom:
- clean closet of husband's junk
- box and store extra books

Small bathroom:
- have super put down new waterproof epoxy grout stuff at base of shower, as old stuff is grungy and brown
- try to lighten stain on shower floor
- change shower curtain

Big bathroom:
- nothing

Master bedroom:
- clean closets
- move stack of boxes which has served as bedside table to basement storage

Entire apartment:
- vacuum, dust, clean
- keep Handi-wipes on hand for last-minute touchups to bathroom mirrors and bath/kitchen faucets for spur-of-the-moment showings

Let the fun begin!

Gosh, I wish our list had been as short as yours! :-) Good luck!

I have 1" mosaic tiles m'self, a mixture of squares and hexagons, mostly almond, with almond grout. Love the look but I agree that it's rather a PITA to keep clean (I will grant that if I had been able to find a sheet vinyl in a vintage-hex-tile pattern, I would gladly have used that!). About six weeks after it was installed I had to have the plumber in to work on the radiator. He showed up in brand new jeans and sat down on the floor, coloring about six square feet of that stinkin' grout baby blue, which I did not discover until days later. Spent many hours trying to get that indigo dye off (we're talking right up to a paste of "Cascade with bleach" dishwasher detergent applied with a Scumbuster electric scrubber). I haven't yet found a colorant to match the grout, but it's on the to-do list. Right now there's a rug on top of the stain. ;-) (BTW, it was epoxy grout, too. It's nowhere near as stain-resistant as touted and a big waste of money IMHO.)

2 cleaners I use that are heavy duty, Greased Lightening & Krud Kutter. They take just about everything off, I used them on my parents tiled bathroom where the floor hadn't been "cleaned" in years. If the cascade didn't work, I doubt Clorox Cleanup would either.

Do you have a bleach pen?

We may have been separated at birth. I too am actually enjoying the process! Just last night I told my (horrified) family that I was really enjoying this challenge. They looked at me like I had just sprouted another head. (Though having to leave for showings is kind of a pain with all my kids and dogs.....)

I did everything on your list, and you're right on. It needs to look as close to a model home as possible, and have no visible scratches on woodwork, etc. We cleaned/painted/stained every surface of every room. Literally.

We then "staged" every room; rearranged furniture to best show off the space, and then eliminated any evidence that someone actually lives there.

The thing that surprised me is that my kids' rooms are painted in these CRAZY murals. I fully expected people to request/demand we repaint, but to my shock, everyone has loved them, and has commented how it's so nice to see some personality in a house. That one surprised me.

My husbands new shirt must have been made of that same denim. I presoaked it in a bucket to get some of the dye out and it was so strong I actually could smell the dye and it stained my bucket! Took many soak & rinses.

Roselvr, we use Greased Lightning in our powerwasher and probably already have some in garage. I'll give it a try. Thanks, Sandy

Buying a bleach pen would probably be a waste considering our cleaning lady resorted to trying straight bleach on the stained grout. I had to leave the house for the rest of the day since the smell of bleach = insta-migraine. The plumber apologized but that was it (and unfortunately it's SO hard to find a reliable plumber who actually returns phone calls and isn't a complete Neanderthal that I daren't fire him lest I not be able to find another). I bought Krud Kutter to get up the sticky crud from removing the vinyl floor in the upstairs bath and everywhere that any spatter/overspray touched paint the surface bubbled and pocked, and the paint peeled off! That is some scary stuff! Touching up semigloss paint really sucks, BTW.

I was thinking the bleach pen because it's a thicker consistency, it will stay on it instead of soaking through like bleach will. I would then take a firm toothbrush to it.

What we are working on now is a large front porch, large back porch, a deck off the master b/rm, and another small porch off the den. All of the railings/banisters are white so it's really time consuming. We had to "de-algaeize and de-mildew" first and sand off any peeling paint. Hubby is about ready to learn what "staging" is, but this will be the fun part, as then you know you can move on to the next project!

We will be finished with this big project on Monday, then we have to fill in a large hole after taking down an above ground pool, and hopefully get some grass planted. This is going to be a full day's job.

Things we plan to do inside:

1. Replace the master bath light.
2. Repaint the master bedroom.
3. Touch up the paint in the den.
4. Repaint fireplace mantel/trim in the den.
5. Paint brick in the den on fireplace.
6. New vinyl linoleum in kitchen/breakfast room/small hallway and laundry "closet". May get an estimate on tiling these areas.
7. New sink and faucet in the kitchen.
8. New hardware in the kitchen (already have, just not installed yet.)
9. Repaint kitchen from a royal blue to a neutral color (using Ralph Lauren "Raffia"). Have this in the den & love it.
10. Hang valances in the breakfast room. Paint breakfast room.
11. Hang long drapes in the great room.
12. Take down wallpaper in dining room, paint "Raffia" same as kitchen.
13. Get roof leak repaired - top priority on this one!
14. Repair damaged window sill in master bath. Got estimate today of $200, so will go with this guy. The window has to be taken completely out.
15. Replace chandelier in dining room to more modern fixture.
16. Replace ugly cheap brass fixture in foyer.
17. Paint water damaged ceiling - after repair is done. Son is doing this for us...free!
18. Repair garage door.
19. Two new garage door openers.
20. Buy new umbrella for the deck table (not that we have ever sat out there, but you know, staging!)

I think that's enough for right now, but there's a lot more I haven't mentioned, esp. landscaping, clean out gutters, plant flowers, decorate front porch, etc, etc. Oh, and I left out clean out the attic and the basement.

We got lucky on our windows, Republic has a lifetime guarantee and they are replacing about 8 windows with the seals broken for free. The warrantee transfers to new owners too. The broken one from the baseball of son #1..we are paying for that one.

It's not fun selling a house, but we are looking forward to our new home and know that those owners are dealing with mold in the attic and windows too!

This week i'll touch up painting on the faux tile design I did on the patio, replace a dead plant, add a couple of ferns to shady areas(leave in pots), add two hanging pots, add a taller plant in the corner on the patio, and remove the old porch lights and add new shiny ones. I'm thinking of buying a couple of wicker chairs for the patio,too.

Whewwwwwww, i'm exhausted after reading all of that! ;o)

patty_cakes

The condo association allowed you to do all that to the front door? I thought that the outside stuff was the domain of the association.

And, I never thought about painting the floor of the garage? How difficult was it, and what color did you paint it? But, wouldn't any dripping oil from a car destroy the paint then?

I've lived here since 2000, since I've been here, I became disabled but still managed to do things like paint and landscape. Since there was a lot of paneling, I couldn't do that myself. We ended up doing a room almost every year with new sheet rock and had 1 left when we thought to sell. By this time the house could use paint again, plus things we hadn't done like flooring. Was it worth it, sure. The house is finally the way I envisioned it, too bad we need a bigger house.

During the time I was here, I was down twice for back surgery and my dad was sick (cancer) with me being his main care giver for medical, so that set me back almost 3 years.

We've been working on the house every year I've been here. One year we had the crazy idea to move the front walkway & change the back patio, so that took a summer...

As I said upthread, we had planned to stay here for 10-15 years and had put together a "5 year plan" for the house a little over a year after we moved in. It would have been nice if we had cash coming out our ears so we could have done everything all at once, but when we finished one project we had to save up for the next. 2005-06 was the master suite, 2007-08 was to be the kitchen, utility/powder room and the downstairs moldings, 2009 was to be the upstairs bath and adjoining office and upstairs moldings, 2010 was to be exterior siding. There was no point in doing anything with the kitchen (for example) because we were going to tear it out, but nothing had been done with the kitchen since it was built and it had not been treated with great care so it looked rather ratty. (Even though our house was built in 1994, we think the builder bought all the cheap stuff left over from the 1980s that no one else wanted, because it just screamed "1980s" before we spiffed it up. And the worst of the 1980s at that!) Life intruded on our neat little plans, so we hadn't gotten a lot of stuff that needed to be done to update the house and make it look nice. Had we left things looking the way they were the house would have skewed toward the "fixer-upper" end of the spectrum which meant a lower price. It's one thing if your house is old enough to be "quaint" and "charming", very much another if it just looks worn and blah.

We decided for sure that we were putting on the market that week on a Monday. Monday I stayed home from work and boxed up almost all the books on the bookshelves, extra items from the kitchen, toys, our bedding, etc. and moved them all to the garage. I also moved two of the dining room chairs, cabinets from the FR, ottoman, extra office chair, pac man console table, etc. all to the garage. I asked the agent if we should rent a storage space and she said garage was fine. I donated half my clothes to Goodwill. Moved small kitchen appliances and dishdrainer off the counters. DH took off another day and planted flowers, touched up paint, fixed ceiling fan, cleaned out the garage bonus room etc. I also replaced all the CFL light bulbs with standard light bulbs and replaced some of our under cabinet light bulbs that had burned out.

We had carpet cleaners come Wed, window cleaners and house cleaners come on Thursday. Thursday the agent came over with a gazillion plants and pictures, as well as new bed lines and towels and arranged it all.

Friday we went to market and had the open house Sat/Sun. Our market is still relatively fast and we had the place sold on Wednesday with multiple offers.

One thing that surprised me is that we have a mural in my sons's room and I thought we would need to repaint it. Both agents we interviewed said to definitely keep it as a selling point. The couple that bought the house are expecting and plan to keep the mural, so I guess it did help!

I thought of one more surprising thing - our agent had us leave some personal photos up in the upstairs landing. We had two wedding pictures and one baby picture and she said we could leave those.

It's true that we could have done things like touch up paint, window cleaning, etc while we were living here, but life get's in the way. I'll try and remember to have those done more often in the new house because it was nice to have the place shining!

I think clean is the name of the game! Upgrading is nice, but a clean and well taken care of home shows love, and IMO, makes others 'fall in love'. ;o)

patty_cakes

I think the most important thing to know is the market for your area. Clean and bright is the way to go. Do the top of the line improvements only if you live in a top of the line neighborhood otherwise you'll price yourself out of making a profit!

Jane

I decided to go to Penneys to see what bed sets they had and ordered 3, keeping one. We went to Benjamine Moore 3 days this week, forgetting the carpet sample the 1st, the 2nd the color expert wasn't there. We went back yesterday and bought paint - pretty expensive compared to buying Behr from Depot.

We're in the process of painting all of the smoky slate molding / windows a lighter color and hope to put 1 coat on the walls today. I may have the new scarfs up for the agents open Tuesday but won't have the privacy curtains ready as I have to sew.

If anyone wants to see the pics, link is below. Hubby used the BM program to "paint" the walls to see what it would look like. The painting over the bed is going as it matched our old set.

If you do the above, bet your home will sell fast. Ours sold in two weeks. The house is 40 years old, but we did all of the above and updated it with inexpensive hardware, faucets and fixtures.

Potted plants on the front porch and patio also help. An American flag hanging outside is a wonderful addition, as well.

Jane

This was what the color expert deemed "elegant" he also gave us two other choice 1 conservative - 1 warm. I'll get actual pics once we're done which should be today..

I posted on the decorating forum but didn't get any feedback.

Does every BM have a 'color expert'?

Not sure. We only went to one store although there's a few we could have gone to. One was a hardware store, doubt they'd have anything more then a paint mixer.

Also what we found is that the BM store locater is too up to date, and not always correct. We set out for one store but couldn't find it. After calling the 800 number, I found they hadn't moved into that location yet.

Agent Questions

Name ______________________________ Office Name _________________________

1) How much is your commission? _____________

2) Is it negotiable if you bring a buyer?

3) How much do you give to the selling agent if you do not bring a buyer in?

4) What if I bring in a buyer?

5) Where do you rank on the MLS?

6) Where do you rank on the Re/Max team?

7) Do you work with the military?

8) Are you or your office listed at base housing?

9) How long have you been in the business?

10) Are you full time, part time, do you work another job?

11) How many houses a year do you sell_____ How many do you list______

12) Do you have your own web site, in addition to the agent link on the office web site?

13) How much of your business comes from the web site? _________________%

14) Do you pay for enhanced listings with multiple pictures on Realtor.com?

15) What kind of advertising do you do and where?

16) Do you advertise price drops in the paper (Sunday only)

17) Do you advertise open houses in the paper (Friday – Sunday)?

18) Do you use an info box?

19)Do you have an assistant? YES _____NO

20) If an assistant: who is the one you would be dealing with for questions,and such? Explain assistants role

21) If I need to speak with the listing agent for something, how is that handled?

22) When an offer comes in, who does the negotiating, the agent or the assistant?

23) What are the days on market for a house selling in my price range?

24) Do you take your own photos?

Thanks again, roselvr. ;o)

The military question is geared towards people like me living close to a base. After being on the market for almost 3 months with 3 showings (1 was today) I wondered if my agent was missing something; so I posted at another board I go to that has a lot of military. They gave me some wonderful tips - which if anyone wants to see the details I can post that also.

#15 - this can include what real estate books as well as different newspapers. I'm fairly close to Philadelphia and with a lot of people working in NY, we're seeing people move down here. I'd never thought to advertise in some of the North Jersey papers until a few weeks ago.

Craigslist was suggested to me by my military friends. Some agents post there, others don't. I was told that they like to check there, so I'm making sure that I post an ad every few days to different sections.

Teresa

Planning to sell and the floors need sanding. I would be interested hearing what is involved with this product.

Jane

http://www.idealtruevalue.com/servlet/the-139970/Detail

We used it on floors to just "perk them up." It was easy and it made a huge difference.

We pulled up and the floors were stained in a number of places including black marks from the carpet tacks. I've had dogs over the years and apparently a few had accidents I wasn't aware of.

I had a floor refinisher come and he said most stains would sand out, except for the black dog stains. He has to replace the boards. He said he can't sand out the black nail marks but they are along the base board and won't be noticeable. I need 5 boards replaced and he said he wouldn't charge, but it means we now have to stain and poly which adds to the cost.

My livingroom/dining room is large and I had a oriental rug under my coffee table. When I pulled it up there was a dinner-size black stain under that rug. I can't afford to do that whole area. I'm going to try to disguise the stain somehow.

I regret pulling up the carpet.

Jane