How to Sell a House?

It took 9 months for mine to sell in NC. It took 11 for the house before that in VA.

IN the last house we had to:
replace carpet
replace wood floors
paint all the walls a cream, beige
professionally clean it
Professionally manicure the lawn
Fire our real estate agent~We fired the one girl in Oct, hired a new one Nov 1, and Dec 24 went under contract. First girl had the house since March
Open houses
Real estate incentives, we had to offer a $2000 real estate incentive, bribe, to have the other agents bring people to our house. This I did npt agree with but it is becoming the norm on the East coast
Real estate open houses/walk through
Power wash the outside
Bring flowers to the outside, window boxes, planters
Our new girl did a lot of work to sell our house.

Are you near a base
List it on militarybyowner.com and any yard sale ads you have in ID. IN NC we had the Lejeune yard sales which allowed us to list houses.

I would try and advertise it more. Put flyers in the free books you see at the grocery store or in banks that have home for sale. Hang signs at local stores, maybe the library or anywhere else that allows public people to advertise.

I would also approach your realator and say that you understand you are not her only client, but you need her to focus more on getting your house sold, or you would like her to recommend someone that has more time to dedicate to it. I am sure she will be anxious to take in the commission, but she needs to be just as anxious to get the place sold for you.

Is your house totally decluttered? Does each room have a purpose? Your dining room should not be a play room for the kids:) Also, first impressions really matter so make sure your yard is immaculate. You could also plant flowers or have potted flowers if you do not already. A real-estate agent once told me you need your house to show like a sample house. When we were selling our first house we rented storage and moved a couple of truck loads of stuff out of our house. The realtor also suggested that we empty our closets of all clothes that are not in season so when someone opens the closet they just think how spacious it is. After we moved in to our first house we realized it did not have a pantry. We then figured that was why there were storage shelves lining the wall to the basement but when we looked at the house those shelves were empty. Also, When we were moving we even packed up 75% of my daughters toys.

First congrats on your hubby's new job!

Here's a link to a site that I found about staging.
http://www.hgtv.com/dos-and-donts-staging/package/index.html

I love to watch the home and garden channel, they've got all kinds of ideas! It'll probably be a little difficult to do it by yourself and with the kids but I'm sure you can do it! :-)

Good luck!

I had my house staged to sell it. A company comes in and puts in their nice furniture, much more minimalist. Of course, I wasn't living in it at the time so all the kid stuff was out of there. Good luck.

I totally agree with J.C. Make sure your house is not cluttered. When I put my house on the market, I just left the bare essentials in the house. Remove all personal items such as pictures. Your walls should be bare. Closets should also just have your bare essentials also. Have you shampoo the carpets? Put down runners if you need to for the worn areas. The more open the house looks, the better your chances. Good luck.

Have a serious talk with your realtor. How long are you under contract for with that realtor? Ask to see the marketing plan for your house. How many open houses or realtor walk throughs have been held to show your house? If these have been held, what is the feedback-what did they like about your home, what did they dislike? How well does your house show? It is hard to keep it clean and uncluttered when you are living there? If you have a lot of stuff, consider a storage unit. Make sure the front of your house has curb appeal. Does it look inviting? We are thinking about downsizing, and I get a weekly listing of homes for sale in the area we are interested in. The new listings or the just reduced homes always go to the top of the list for more emphasis. If you drop the price a little ($1000-2000) will the house go back on the top of the list circulated to other realtors?? You could also offer a selling bonus to the selling realtor to get more action on your house.