How to prepare your property for sale?
JUNE 25, 2019 | PROPOSED BY OUR PARTNER ING LUXEMBOURG
Even if the Luxembourg market is very active, selling its property is far from being a sinecure. Here are some tips to make a sale as fast as possible and at the best price.
Evaluate your property correctly
First of all, find out about market prices and consult real estate listings for similar properties in the same sector as yours. If necessary, get help from a real estate expert .
If you overvalue your property, you will have trouble selling it, and if not, you will not only lose it, but potential buyers will be wary.
Put your property on sale at the right time
Most specialists consider that the best time of the year to sell your property is spring . People prefer to buy during this season to be able to move during the holidays and not to disturb the school year of their children. Fall is also a good time, with National Housing Week taking place every year in October.
Enhance your home with home staging
Invented in 1972 by the American Barb Schwartz, the "home staging" (the staging of property) aims to enhance the assets of your property so that its sale is the fastest and most profitable possible. Studies have shown that the first minutes of the visit by a buyer candidate are the most important. Either he is immediately seduced or he is not.
Many professionals in Luxembourg, including real estate agencies , offer home staging services but you can also do it yourself. Finally, the principles of this concept are common sense.
Declutter
To make your property attractive and stand out from the crowd, you must first de-clutter it by removing some large furniture to open the space and visually enlarge your interior. Do not empty it either, because empty parts appear smaller than they actually are. In the same vein, give a little more brightness to your interior by avoiding the accumulation of curtains, blinds and other curtains around your windows.
Depersonalize
You will then have to depersonalize your property and make it as neutral as possible. Remove all the emotional symbols, like family photos or political or religious signs. If necessary, replace the current colors with more neutral tones such as white or beige: it is not certain that the buyer candidate shares your immoderate love of orange or apple green if this is your case ! By doing this, you leave the visitor the opportunity to project themselves into the scene. Do not fall into excessive sobriety either : your property must stay warm.
repair
Maintaining and repairing are also necessary steps. Be particularly attentive to small details. Replace defective light bulbs, repair leaky faucets, remove dead vegetation from your deck or balcony, and fix small defects that you no longer pay attention to because you've seen them for years. The buyer candidate will see them and could rightly ask if the good you are trying to sell him is as functional as you claim.
Finally, think about cleaning everything thoroughly. Here too, the details will be important : clean beds with freshly laundered bedding, no old worn and stained carpets, and no smell of animals, cigarettes or dampness.
Prepare the visits
If you chose to take care of the sale of your property yourself, do not forget that improvisation is out of place. Set preferably appointment in the day to enjoy maximum brightness.
Do not be caught off guard by visitors' questions. Prepare your answers in advance and make available all the necessary documents, such as the energy performance certificate, the plans of the house, the cadastral situation and possibly the invoices of your recent works. Do not forget to highlight the strong points of the accommodation as well as its geographical location (nursery or school nearby, public transport and shops or supermarkets in the neighborhood ...).
Do not hide any defect or problem past or future (water damage, roof partly to change, future expensive work planned by the condominium ...), because it could turn against you. If important work is needed, show the quotes you have done upstream. This is the little extra that will demonstrate to the prospective buyer that you play transparency.
Obviously, the steps mentioned throughout these lines require time and a minimum of experience , and it is not certain that you can accomplish all of them. In this case, the best solution is to use a real estate agency.
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