Decluttering Tips
So The Buyers Can See
What They Are Meant to See
The First of My Decluttering Tips is to Refer to list of positives that you hopefully made when completing the detach yourself excercise.
Because....
Dealing with clutter can be a very difficult step for many people.
If you want to get your home or “product” ready to sell it is imperative, that you declutter.
(from the detach yourself exercise)
before eliminating clutter.
FIRST
Make a list of friends and acquaintances that will honestly critique the decluttering process.
An outside non emotionally attached person who can give you an honest opinion can be an asset when implementing these decluttering tips.
You CAN do this yourself if you follow these steps.
Keep in mind that a professional stager would go through your home with a trained and objective eye giving you a “to do list” before they even begin staging your home. That list would be to declutter many of your items. HINT
This is a good time to rent a storage unit or a storage moving pod. Moving pods will make this process much easier. If you are not familiar with moving pods, they are wonderful storage pod/crate that is dropped off at your residence. You keep them as long as you need to, fill it up, and they take it away and store it. When you are ready, they will deliver it to your new home. It is time to collect those boxes and start packing and declutter.
Keep In Mind
Many times a house with more square footage is filled up with so much stuff that the house "appears" smaller to the buyer. The buyer then chooses the house that has less square footage, but "shows" as if it has more square footage. Square footage = dollars in your pocket.
If you have NOT done so yet start with the depersonalizing step. This is helpful before you declutter.
Next, you begin, eliminating clutter.
Living Room and / or Family Room
There should be ample traffic flow through the room (36” walking space minimum).
Television: If the television is large and is dictates the focal point of the seating arrangement, or if it overwhelms the room, then it should be removed. For example: If you have a fireplace, and the seating arrangement IGNORES the fireplace as a focal point and is arranged for TV viewing, you need to change this so that you point out to the buyers the features of the home. I know this is a difficult one, remember… ”The way we live in our home is NOT the way we sell our home.”
Dining Room
Depersonalize
and declutter by removing all photos, trinkets, china, over stuffed china cabinets. You may need to remove china cabinets and buffets entirely if: They can fill up the dining room, overwhelm the space, and/or don’t allow ample traffic flow,(36” walking space minimum). The goal is to make sure the room looks as large as possible
maximizing the square footage
(even if it is visually).
Kitchen:
Declutter the counter tops by removing all of the items on it. Yes, I know that is hard to imagine. Remember the way you sell your home is not they way you live in your house. Scale down the items you need to use frequently and store those items such as a toaster, and coffee maker in a cabinet that above or below the counter top. It may be necessary to declutter inside of your cabinets. Therefore, you may have to pack up some of those cupboards in order to make room for your counter top items. This will help preparing your home for a showing easier by clearing off the counter tops each morning. (Often a showing can occur while you are at work during the day.) A few examples are: dishes,(excessive sippy cups, bottles)“been there done that,” plastic storage containers, pans, bowls, rarely used kitchen appliances, and spices etc... The buyers will look in the cupboards. When the cupboards are organized and not over crowded with the sellers personal items, it then becomes easier for them to imagine themselves living there. If you have extra freestanding storage units they must be removed. You do not want buyers to think that there may not be enough storage in the kitchen.
Eat in Kitchens
Keep an appropriate sized table and chairs. Remove any extra buffets, book cases, and desks. You need to show off this space as what it is meant for. Make sure you are leaving ample room to walk around the table and chairs.
Master Bedroom:
By now you should have
depersonalized
and decluttered by removing all photos, trinkets, and storage boxes in those extra rooms. Make sure that the bed is NOT too large for the bedroom. A king size bed my be so large you are unable to have any other furniture in the room. If so I suggest you swap it out for a queen sized bed until you move into your new home.
If the room is small and you have a dresser or dressers that are filling up the space, remove them and put them in storage. Store off seasons clothes under the bed or box them up and store in your pod. The end tables should be appropriate sizes. If your master bedroom is large and you have several dressers, remove the extra dressers and keep an appropriate sized dresser. If you have television in your bedroom either keep it concealed in a armoire otherwise the television should be removed
Child's Bedroom:
Just as in the master bedroom evaluate the size of the bed. Remove extra furniture such as dressers, a lot off the toys, toy boxes, large toys, desks, and cubbies. TIP A good idea is to store extra toys at a friend, or family or garage then change them out. It will be like new toys all over again! Clear out the clothes that the kids have outgrown or are out of season. The less crowded and neater the closets are kept, the easier it is for potential buyer what they are buying, and to imagine themselves living there. You don’t want the buyer to think that there is a shortage of storage either. LESS IS MORE!
Bathrooms:
Eliminating the clutter from the counter tops, the hampers, kids bath toys, toddler potties and even the shower products is a MUST. HINTBuy a little basket with handles and place your shower and bath products in it and put them away when showing the house.
Offices:
If you are using a bed room as an office pack it up, a bedroom is worth more to buyers than an office. You can consolidate the office into a closet. This is necessary if you are using a 2 or 3 bedroom home and using one of those rooms as a office. A bedroom is much more appealing to potential buyer and this adds square footage to the home. Now if you have a 4 bedroom house it would acceptable to have it as an office. The office should be deluttered, pack up extra books, text books, general clutter, file paper work. Remove any bookcases,and extra chairs that take up the square footage. Now is a good time to have one of those people on your list to walk through the house and point out any clutter that you are not seeing. An objective eye is always helpful! That is what the professional stager brings to the table, with your willingness and an open mind. You can do this! Now that you have completed the most emotionally challenging project pat yourself on the back. This is a high impact, low to no cost project
Print out the Decluttering Tips checklist to help with the process.
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