This summer we are looking at “power moves” to market your home. We are not trying to “sell” your home - that is the desired outcome. Instead, we are focusing on marketing your home.
Recently we looked at the importance of curb appeal, and we agreed that if your prospects are turned of by the exterior of your home, they will likely never see the inside.
Now we’ll move onto depersonalizing your home in order to boost its emotional appeal to potential buyers.
Know this: People buy real estate emotionally, then justify it logically.
I’ve worked with literally hundreds of buyers and sellers, helping them achieve their real estate goals, and it always boils down to the same question:
“Will we love living here, and will this be a good place for us to raise our family?”
OK, I agree that emotion won’t make the wrong house right. Even if you love it, a house with one bedroom and no baths probably won’t sell.
But if the decision to purchase comes down to two very similar houses, each meeting the basic requirements of the buyer, the one that appeals to emotion will win out almost every time over one that generates negative responses.
Here are some ideas on how to avoid negative emotions:
• Remove all personal items from your home before showing it to prospective purchasers. Family photos, wedding pictures, family keepsakes, trophies, awards all serve to make the prospect feel like an intruder. Get rid of them.
• I once showed a home to a young couple - everything was going great. The size and price were right. The location was perfect, the condition acceptable. Then it happened.
We walked into the den, and there on the wall, framed and under glass, was a three by five foot red flag with a white circle and a black swastika in the center. The young wife indicated that she felt uncomfortable and wished to leave the house immediately. She later confided that she could never live in a house “like that.”
In fact, the seller was a veteran of the Second World War, and had commanded a unit under Gen. George Patton during his campaign in Europe. The flag had been given to him by the grateful mayor of a town his unit liberated from Nazi occupation.
• Temporarily remove any religious symbols. An “open house” serves its purpose best when all who view the house can feel welcome.
• On another occasion, I was asked to assist a retiring couple in the sale of their house. I was invited to view the property and make suggestions for marketing. So I did just that.
This was, mind you, a large house with large rooms and nine foot ceilings. Normally this would be the kind of house you might spend a lifetime filling up with furniture. The problem was that the sellers had done just that, and there was hardly room to walk between the overstuffed chairs, the huge credenzas, and the massive knick-knacks.
When I suggested that some of the excess might need to be removed or stored during the marketing period, the lady of the house countered that all this beautiful heirloom furniture was an inheritance from her great aunt Gertrude, and that it would be important to the sale of the home that it remain in place.
That was almost 10 years ago, and to my knowledge the house has yet to sell.
• Finally, I will never forget a “for sale” house where the seller insisted on being present during any showing of the property. Worse than being intrusive, he acted like he was delivering a rehearsed “tour” of the property, focused primarily on his two wonderful girls and their lifetimes of remarkable achievement.
When the buyers returned to my car, we all laughed about the “trophy house.” Yes, it was humorous at the time, but the house was never again seriously considered by my purchasers.
Learn from these mistakes: make your home warm and inviting, and remove anything and everything that might serve to prevent a prospect from mentally “moving in.” If the buyer can’t mentally imagine themselves living comfortably in your home, they probably won’t buy your home. And that’s the bottom line.
Native Atlantan John Adams is a real estate broker, investor, and author. He answers real estate questions every Sunday at 3 pm on WGKA-am(920). He welcomes your comments at Money99.com, where you will find previous columns and an expanded version of this column.
About the Author
