- Move Out Emotionally
- Develop Your Buyer’s Critical Eye
- Take a Photo Why Don’t Ya!
Move Out Emotionally
Once you understand that it’s imperative for you to see your house objectively through a buyer’s eyes, it’s not hard to do. Step One. You have to move out! Okay, not physically…yet…but mentally and emotionally. You have “leave” in order to arrive at your house as if you are seeing it for the first time. You need to be a buyer before you can become the seller!
Go away for a few days, or even a few hours if you are short on time. But, when you return, “arrive” as a prospective buyer. Approach your house from a different direction than you normally do. Take different streets. Look at your house as you drive up, try to see it as if for the first time. Shake things up. Don’t park in your garage. Park on the street, just as if you were there to preview the house. Walk up to the front door, and ring the doorbell.
Go away for a few days, or even a few hours if you are short on time. But, when you return, “arrive” as a prospective buyer. Approach your house from a different direction than you normally do. Take different streets. Look at your house as you drive up, try to see it as if for the first time. Shake things up. Don’t park in your garage. Park on the street, just as if you were there to preview the house. Walk up to the front door, and ring the doorbell.
Go through the entire house this way. Observe and see the house for the first time. Sit in the living room for a moment, but NOT in your favorite chair. Use the powder room. You have probably never been in there except on cleaning days. Continue through each room and end in the backyard.
Turn around and look back at your home. Take just one minute to thank that home for all of the time it sheltered you and served as a gathering place for you and yours. Now say goodbye to your home…and say hello to the house you are going to sell. For the next 30 to 60 days, commit to seeing it and living in it in a new fresh way…just as your buyers will.
Develop Your Buyer’s Critical Eye
Here is another great technique for seeing your house through your buyers’ eyes. This one really helps to identify problems and negativities about your house. As thehome owner, you don’t notice them, but as the home buyer, you sure will!
Develop Your Buyer’s Critical Eye
Here is another great technique for seeing your house through your buyers’ eyes. This one really helps to identify problems and negativities about your house. As thehome owner, you don’t notice them, but as the home buyer, you sure will!
Again, pretend you are seeing your house for the first time. Take note of the first three negative feelings or impressions that come to you as you look at the house. For example, your first three reactions might be:
- Negative #1. The house feels so bare.
- Negative #2. It looks cheap and really tacky.
- Negative #3. The neighbors are too close.
Once you have identified your first impressions, quickly analyze the problems that create that first impression:
- Problem #1. The house feels bare because there is almost no landscaping.
- Problem #2. It looks cheap and tacky because the front door is cheesy, and the front windows are aluminum and don’t match the original upper floor wood windows
- Problem #3. Nothing separates it from the house next door or defines yard lines.
Now, decide on a solution for each problem:
- Solution #1. I could plant flowering bushes next to the house, put white roses along the walk way and a plant green lawn.
- Solution #2. I could install a new solid-looking front door and give it a good glossy paint color. I will replace the aluminum window with some substantial wooden windows in the original architectural style.
- Solution #3. I could put in fencing or hedges along the sides of the house to help block out the neighbors and take command of the property lines.
Congratulations! You have just learned how to see your home exactly as a critical buyer would. You identified your negative feeling about a house, analyzed the problem that created it and found an essential solution. Now do the same thing throughout your property and go room by room!
Take a Photo Why Don’t Ya
Take a Photo Why Don’t Ya
In the entertainment business, when an opportunity for a great photo emerges, it’s called a photo op. Well, here’s your photo op! The third great technique to seeing your home with a buyer’s eyes is to photograph it. By looking atphotographs of your home—from the street to the entranceway, backyard, driveway, garage, and to every room throughout the house—you are able to see your home right now exactly as a buyer would see it. It allows you to be one step removed from your house, which is an essential step in helping you decide what you need to upgrade, replace or spruce up to make your house worth top dollar.
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