If you want to sell your home, you might not have much time to make all the repairs it needs. Why is it important to do these things before the event? If your house stays on the market for a long time, the first price cut will cost you a lot more than the improvements you make now.
Even if your home doesn’t stay on the market for long, a buyer could ask for credits and concessions for things you didn’t fix. You could lose a lot more than you ever would have spent. Yet this is not the only reason to make these repairs before you sell; read on to find out more.
There Will Be An Inspection
There will be a buyer’s inspection, and the inspector will be able to point out any problems and recommend fixes. As a result, there is no escaping it at all. The problem is that at this stage, you may not want to lose your buyer, especially if it’s taken a while to sell the house.
If that’s the case, any issues with the property will necessitate that you either put things right or lower the price you’re selling at. This may even cause issues with the house you’re trying to buy once you sell yours, so rather than causing any stress at any point, it’s best just to get things done so they can’t be used as leverage.
You Can Do Small Repairs Yourself
So many of the most frequently reported repairs are easy to fix, usually cheap, and can be done by you in a weekend. They’re probably the same things that have been on your list of weekend projects for the past year, and if they bother you, they’ll bother a buyer, too. Leaky faucets, torn window screens, stains on the ceiling, and cracks in the plaster may seem like small problems, and each one is, but when they’re all in the same house, they add up to a big problem for the seller. It could make them think the house is not worth buying.
Although there will be bigger jobs such as air conditioning repairs and anything to do with electrics or the structure of the building that the experts are better off doing, if you can DIY many of the issues that are sure to come up, you’ll save money and ensure there is no cause for complaint. Plus, you could learn some useful skills that might come in handy in your new place.
Buyers Might Not Want To DIY
Everyone is looking for something different in their new home. Some will specifically want a property that needs work done – they’ll want this because it will be cheaper or because they can put their own stamp on it. However, if you intend to market to this set of people, you may find that there are far fewer potential viewers and even fewer potential buyers. The truth is that those looking for a fixer-upper are few and far between compared to the wider market.
Not every buyer will want to buy a house that needs work. Even if it is possible to make changes, the extra work and time may be too expensive. Or, buyers may not be interested in (or know how to do) home improvement projects. So if you fix up your home before putting it on the market, you may attract more buyers. The numbers make sense; the more people who are interested in your property, the more chance there is of selling it at the right price for you.
You Can Increase The Curb Appeal
Don’t think that “love at first sight” is only important in relationships; it can also help you sell a house. Renovating your home can make it more appealing to potential buyers from the start. Fixing things up helps a listing look finished, clean, and ready to go. By making a listing look better from the street, sellers are more likely to sell it quickly. This is called having curb appeal, and it’s crucial if you want to sell your home not just quickly but for a good price.
You Can Budget More Effectively
Since you don’t have time to shop around for a less expensive estimate, repairs done at the last minute are almost always more expensive. Plus, the fact that you are short on time makes it easy for tradespeople to charge you more for squeezing the work into their schedules.
To avoid this issue, make the repairs with plenty of time to spare – ideally before you even list the property. That way, you can budget more effectively and save yourself money, and you’ll know that when you put your property on the market, you’re doing so when it’s at its best.
Better Maintenance
Apart from the fact that your home just won’t look great if you leave repairs and don’t do anything about them, the big problem that buyers will think about when they see work has to be done is that they will question how well you maintain your home.
In other words, they might wonder what else needs to be done that they can’t see because they know there are things they can see. They might be concerned that there are bigger, more expensive issues to have to deal with.
The more you can work on fixing these issues, the better an impression you’ll give to your potential buyers and the more confident they will be to make an offer – possibly a higher offer than they would otherwise have done.
Viewers Won’t Be Distracted
Buyers will have a great experience if you remove any negative aspects of your house. Open house guests will be able to concentrate on the great aspects of your property rather than the negative ones. In other words, there will be nothing to distract them from the good parts of your home.
This means they will more easily be able to imagine living there themselves, and if they get an overall positive feeling about the property, that’s definitely a good sign and will help them make a buying decision, ideally in your favor.
