Ready to sell your house in Dallas/Fort Worth? Even in a seller’s market, you can’t just stick a for-sale in the front and then sit back and wait for the offers to start rolling in. Usually, in order to sell your house, you’ll have to make at least a few improvements. The trick lies in understanding what will help you sell sooner and for more and what will hurt your chances of doing so. To help you out, here are some insider design tips to help you sell your house in Dallas/Fort Worth.
Declutter
Although advising you to declutter isn’t strictly a design tip to help you sell your house in Dallas/Fort Worth, it is nevertheless essential for allowing your design elements to show. Decluttering is the first step in any design makeover intended to attract buyers.
When it comes to decluttering to help you sell your house in Dallas/Fort Worth, here’s what the pros advise: “You want prospective buyers to see the ‘bones’ of the property and not be distracted by clutter or art collections or tabletops filled with family photos . . . Organize the closets, clear the kitchen countertops, remove decorative magnets and the children’s drawings off the refrigerator. [Sometimes] some furniture [should] be removed to give a room a more open, airy feeling.”
Remodel Judiciously
This second of our tips for selling your house is also tangentially a design tip, but it too is important. If you’re considering doing some remodeling, make sure you do it judiciously. Here’s what we mean . . .
It’s true that more bathrooms will typically help you sell your house in Dallas/Fort Worth. In fact, each additional full bath adds “about 24% to the selling price.”
But adding a bath or doing a major kitchen remodel may not do the trick and may be wasted money. “[S]sometimes a big investment won’t be what your potential buyer wants in a home. What one seller might choose as stylish and expensive is often ripped out and re-done by new buyers . . . Beautiful new countertops, kitchen cabinets, appliances – sometimes never used – get ripped out and thrown away so that the new owners can install their particular style.”
Keep in mind that the value of an improvement is actually tied to the value of your home and how that compares to other similar homes in the neighborhood. So before investing in design overhaul or improvements, consider other homes in the neighborhood in the same price range as yours.
Your Dallas/Fort Worth agent who thoroughly understands the local market can be an invaluable resource here. To discover more about this, just call (469) 840-4449.
Keep It Consistent With the Neighborhood
In a similar vein, whatever you do to your home should be consonant with the character of the neighborhood and the other homes in it. Uniqueness can be a plus, but being too different can hurt your chances of a sale.
If you want to sell your house in Dallas/Fort Worth, you need to see “your home in the context of its neighborhood, especially when it comes to remodeling.” Here’s an illustrative example of this . . .
“[A]n older couple . . . moved into one of Manhattan’s trendiest areas, a part of the city known for its artists’ lofts complete with exposed pipes and open floor plans. The couple spent a huge sum ‘making the apartment look and feel like their house in the suburbs.’ After the renovations were complete, the couple tried to sell, and found it difficult to get a buyer.”
The problem was that, although the space looked very nice, it didn’t “fit with the building or the neighborhood.” And the result was that it sat unsold on the market for a long time.
Again, it’s a good idea to lean on your agent’s expertise in this area.
Don’t Overdo the Decorating
This next of our design tips to help you sell your house in Dallas/Fort Worth has to do with decorating, some of which you’ll certainly want to do. But you have to make sure you don’t overdo it. Potential buyers need to be able to imagine your house as their home decorated in their own style.
When it comes to decorating to sell your house in Dallas/Fort Worth, industry experts stress that “the decor should complement the style of the home. It is important that the decor reflect the character and style of the home . . . Store some art, paint and patch the walls, remove any personal property that does not enhance the style of the home. By incorporating this decorating tip you are attracting buyers and can potentially sell your house for more money.”
Over-decorating should be avoided, but staging is important. Numerous studies have shown that staged homes sell faster and at better prices than those that haven’t been staged. It’s a good idea to hire a professional to help you get all this just right.
Use Neutral Colors and Tones
Preparing a house for sale typically involves repainting, if not on a major scale, at least some of the rooms. And the consensus among real estate pros is that light, neutral color and tones are best to sell your house in Dallas/Fort Worth for the following reasons:
- You need to appeal to a wide range of buyers, and bolder, wilder colors may put off more conservative ones.
- These lighter, neutral colors will make rooms that don’t get a lot of sun appear to have more light and so seem brighter.
- Darker colors make rooms seem smaller and make it more difficult for buyers to imagine it as their space.
- Lighter, neutral colors work better to achieve the desired blank-canvas effect that allows buyers to imagine their belongings in place and to see your house as their home.
Hire a Good Agent
Our final tip to help you sell your house doesn’t really have anything directly to do with design, but may impact all of it. And that is to have a good local agent in your corner to guide you successfully through all your design decisions. If, then, you’re ready to sell your house in Dallas/Fort Worth – without making any design blunders – contact us today at (469) 840-4449.