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There are a few obstacles to putting it on the market right now.
Going into winter would not be optimal, so I am thinking spring.
Is your urgency in listing advice based on what you think will happen to the market between now and then?
That's what we are doing. Waiting until spring. We also need time to empty out the house, and that "emptying" includes two of my siblings who are living there and need to relocate. If the flight out of NYC to the burbs continues as it has been, the market should still be strong in my area. We spoke to our realtor about it.
Would you buy a new home that offered all the upgrades? New home builders spend 100's of thousands in staging their show homes to appeal to the masses. Then they sell upgrades to personalize the homes for your unique tastes.
I recommend you renovate to appeal to the masses, just like a new home builder would.
When you personalize your home to YOUR tastes, you limit your buyer pool come resale time. Best thing to then do is renovate it back to plain mass appealing...
When we built, we stayed away from a spec home for this exact reason. I didn't want the builder spec kitchen, even though one of the spec homes was the floor plan we wanted.
Yes, IF you're going to remodel, you do it for the masses not yourself. In a hot market, I wouldn't bother.
There are a few obstacles to putting it on the market right now.
Going into winter would not be optimal, so I am thinking spring.
Is your urgency in listing advice based on what you think will happen to the market between now and then?
Of course, no one can say for certain what will happen.
My sister is a RE broker in central VA. It's in her opinion that the current real estate market isn't sustainable through next year. While it won't be like it was in 2008, the market will cool off. Inventory will be up, buyers won't be paying more than list price, and homes likely won't go under contract the day they become active. The market will level out to a more "normal" market.
Anyway, that's her opinion about her local market.
There are a few obstacles to putting it on the market right now.
Going into winter would not be optimal, so I am thinking spring.
Is your urgency in listing advice based on what you think will happen to the market between now and then?
We were worried about the same thing back in '18. At the advice of our realtors, we listed it anyway. Hit the MLS just before Thanksgiving, we had a full price offer in 3 weeks and closed just after the 1st of the year.
Many people like me don’t want to have to upgrade and live thru construction. When I buy a home , I want it to be done or little work. I purchased a custom build for that reason. When purchasing rentals I want them as up to,date as possible i dont want to have to spend money fixing it up right away.
I will look on realtor sites and I won’t even go look at a home that needs updating..I just dont want the hassle
I'm in your category. It has to be move-in, do nothing to even get me interested.
Why? Well because I'm now at an age that remodeling must be farmed out (I used to do this stuff all by myself + a full time career). Today, where both of my houses are, there are essentially no available competent handymen, willing contractors, "carpenters" whatever you call them, who are available at any cost, to do a remodel.
Using "Home Advisor" (and Angie's BS) and the local bulletin boards, I encountered everything except someone I'd ever consider hiring to redo a kitchen, a bath or god forbid, move a wall. That stuff is like, so yesterday. A clueless slug, a oxycontin addict, a contractor who wouldn't dream of pulling into your driveway unless it was a $200,000 job. Pfft. Nope. It ain't 2000 anymore.
Overall I am against updating to sell, especially an expensive update as you never know what someones tastes/demands are. You could spend a small fortune on the kitchen and some will not like it. Let someone say well the place needs some updating so I am offering so and so. Let them make an offer first.
I am not against inexpensive updates like carpeting, painting, cleaning, etc. but I would limit such to around $2,500.00
In my view, it depends on who's buying the house. In a market where investors are coming in and doing bash-and-builds (such as what is happening here in Durham, NC where developers are buying up charming bungalows and building "modern" monstrosities that look like stacked cargo containers), there's no point in doing ANY remodeling. But if you are in a market where your buyers are looking to live in a house, and especially if it is a "first-time buyer"-type house, then cosmetic changes can make a difference. Paint the cabinet boxes white (and doors if the style is not dated, otherwise get new doors; they are not hard to hang), put in some granite (which is no longer expensive), and replace the flooring and be done with it. If your appliances are white, leave them, unless you can get a great deal on new. A good realtor will tell you what you should replace.
If you can, get rid of wallpaper borders. They scream mid-1990s.
In my case, I had to do extensive renovations in my old house or it would have been bought at bottom dollar for a tear-down. The kitchen was from the 1970s, the upstairs flooring was old commercial carpeting, and the upstairs bath had olive green fixtures and was in bad shape. We'd never had the ready cash to do this stuff because we'd needed new windows, roof, siding, and basement family room renovation following a flood. Then my husband died and I had money to do it.
In my case it turned my house from a $299K tear-down into a family home that I sold for $425K. So I more than made up for the renovation cost.
Location: Stuck on the East Coast, hoping to head West
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Talk to a realtor. Interview several.
I had an 80s dated kitchen, old laminate flooring and carpet, some not-neutral paint. I painted the cabinets white, painted the counters, the backsplash, installed luxury vinyl planks, neutralized the paint, and listed in summer of 2019 (seller's market in my area). It didn't sell. I pulled the house from the market in the fall.
I got a new realtor who walked in and mentioned 3 very simple things. I did them. Listed in March (right before shut-downs) had an offer in hours and sold. Total cost was about $2500 to prep the house. It was also spotless and staged. Same list price as before. Interestingly, he insisted I have the roof professionally cleaned and that made a world of difference.
Since I failed to sell the house before, I was certain I'd have to upgrade the kitchen (at very least the counters), maybe the bathrooms, etc. That was absolutely not the case and I would've lost money.
FWIW, I wrote my own listing based on prompts from the realtor (why did I buy? why did I stay? what did I love about the house?). It was an awesome listing if I do say so myself.
I hate seeing kitchens where it’s obvious they quickly painted the cabinets and put in the cheapest granite they could find. The sellers expect to get all the money back on the granite but the rest of the kitchen still needs renovating, that granite is going to get trashed along with it. New counters and some paint don’t fix 30 year old kitchens.
Location: Stuck on the East Coast, hoping to head West
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Lbjen
. New counters and some paint don’t fix 30 year old kitchens.
But they can get the house sold.
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