Lately, I have been showing lots of homes to homebuyers, many of them first time homebuyers!  And, believe me, there are a lot of homes for these buyers in Richmond VA to choose from!  So when you are trying to sell your home, you should want your home to stand head & shoulders above your competition!  Why?  Many (not all) homebuyers have trouble envisioning living in the home when they are being presented with messy rooms and very personalized rooms!  So I thought it would be a great idea to show you what I would consider to be a “messy room” and show how you can get it staged to show well with very little investment of money!  So take a look at the picture, and then envision the room with the small changes I have listed below.  And, if you can think of any additional changes this seller can make, feel free to post your comments here!

• Repaint the walls and ceiling a neutral color!  These walls & ceiling are painted a blue (and not just a very light blue, but a very very blue!).  This color tends to make the room feel much smaller & more closed in than it probably is!  Imagine this room with off white walls & ceilings, or even with a color that has a neutral base to it!
• Add curtains to the window!  If you have neutralized the walls, you may wish to use this to add a pop of color to the room! 
• Make the bed!  If you don’t have sheets, pillows & a bed spread that could go on this bed, then someplace like Kmart or Walmart or Target will carry nice bed linens that will not cost an arm & a leg!  And again, another way to add a pop of color to the room!
• Remove the headboard!  The headboard on this bed tends to feel a bit like a child’s headboard, or something the owner may have had for many years!  Remove the headboard and put something like a quilt or a nice picture behind the bed!  Again, another way to add some pops of color to the room!
• Put the clothes into the chest of drawers!  Homebuyers don’t want to see clothes on the floor and unfolded with drawers open!  For some homebuyers, they may interpret this as a sign of a lazy homeowner, and this may mean that if they aren’t picking up the clothes off the floor for a showing they know about, how well do they maintain their home!
• Straighten the closets!  If your closets are small, and you have a lot of clothes, make sure your closets show well!  That means you may need to sort through the closets, perhaps remove the clothes that you won’t wear that season, perhaps purchase hangers that match so the closet has a neat look to it, and perhaps even replace the rod in the closet.  Remember, homebuyers will be opening up the closets & looking in them and the last thing you want them to do is to think the closets don’t have enough room to hold their clothes & shoes!
• Hang some pictures!  Once you neutralize the walls & ceilings, add a few pictures!  But make sure they are not family pictures – remember buyers should be focusing on the room, not your family pictures! And just make sure the colors in the pictures do not clash with the new curtains or bed linens!
• Add nightstands on either side of the bed!  A few appropriately placed accessories on the nightstands can go a long way to making the bedroom look like a bedroom and won’t make the bed look like it is floating on a wall by itself! 
• Add some lamps with low lights to the room!  Many bedrooms do not have overhead lights.  Even if the home is being shown in the middle of the day with the sun shining brightly, you want to have all the lights on in the house!  Adding some lamps to the bedroom will make sure that the room shows as brightly as it can!
• Finally, remove the blue carpet!  Even after neutralizing the walls & ceilings, adding new bed linens & curtains, the blue carpet that is in this room is just too personalized.  Some buyers will continue to have a problem envisioning their furniture in this room!  So remove the carpet!  There are several things you can do here:  if there are wood floors and they are in good shape, why not show them off with a coat of polyurethane and a new area rug?  If there is no wood floors here, perhaps going to a carpet outlet and getting new carpet for the room, or adding laminate floors to the room!  This will certainly help make the room show better to all the buyers you have coming to your home!

Remember, your intention is to get your home sold for the most money you can!  If a buyer has to come in and try to envision themselves in the house they may not be able to do it!  Pricing right is certainly a big key to getting a house sold in this market, but if you price your home right and buyers are not impressed with how your home shows, then you will continue to have your home on the market!  So put your home into the best condition possible!  And envision this room with the changes I have listed above! 

As always, I am available if you have any questions.   Feel free to call or email me if I can answer anything for you!