Ten tips to prepare your home for an open for inspection

The days your home is open for inspection are your chance to show it off at its best to prospective buyers. Don’t let anything get in the way of buyers seeing its positive aspects. Your agent may suggest talking to a stylist or home presentation expert who can give you advice on ways you can improve the look and presentation of your home.

1. Clean, clean, clean

Cleaning your property, really cleaning it, is absolutely essential. Many a prospective buyer has been put off a home that looks dingy and unloved. Be methodical — go from room to room and clean every single surface so it gleams. Clean the windows so they are sparkling and let in the maximum amount of light. Get rid of cobwebs high up on the ceilings, and dust every surface as high as you can reach. Should you clean inside cupboards? Yes. People do look behind doors, so at least have items stacked neatly and wipe the surfaces.

Clean until the place sparkles from floor to ceiling. Rid every corner of grime, cobwebs, mildew, stains, animal hair and dust. Polish windows and mirrors until they gleam. You’ll be amazed at how much more light clean glass lets in. Wipe out the inside of cupboards and drawers. Weed the garden, and sweep the front path.

A professional cleaner might be worthwhile getting in for the first big clean. After that, unless you’re very comfortably off, you may need to have a system to give your home a quick clean in the hour or so before buyers come to visit. Don’t forget toilets, the kitchen sink, mirrors and the front porch. And empty the rubbish bins!

2. Repair obvious problems

Even if you have decided not to carry out a major makeover or renovation of your home, you can still ensure that it’s free of any obvious, unsightly problems. Some prospective buyers may not be able to look past imperfections such as stained surfaces or cracked windows, and may wonder if signs of neglect indicate a home that is not in good repair generally. It’s not that you’re trying to pretend there are no problems — and a building inspection will reveal any obvious cover-ups — you just don’t want to confront visitors with them on their very first excursion through your home.

Spend at least a couple of weekends carrying out some basic repair jobs before you open your home for inspection, and perhaps engage a professional if the work is beyond your abilities. Here are some suggestions:

Fill minor wall cracks with plaster and repaint the wall.

• Replace any broken tiles, and re-grout if necessary.
• Check that the plumbing works properly — some visitors to your home will take the trouble to turn on taps and flush the toilets, so make sure there are no easily fixable problems like water hammer or dripping taps.
• Resurface or paint over chipped or stained surfaces.
• Replace cracked glass or mirrors.

3. Spruce up the garden

You don’t necessarily have to carry out a large landscaping job on your garden before you put the property up for sale, but do make sure it’s free of weeds, that the lawn is kept trim and that you prune shrubs and trees into shape. Some pots of colourful flowers or greenery near the entrance and in the backyard — especially around an outdoor entertaining area — will not go astray. You don’t need to go overboard; it should look natural. Keep newly planted shrubs or plants well watered.

Put garden tools away out of sight, make sure any kids play equipment is tidy and clean, and if you have a pet make sure you clean up any unpleasant evidence left on the lawn.

4. Arrange furniture and furnishings artfully

You’ll have already removed all the unnecessary items cluttering up the rooms in your home. But as you come up to inspection day you need to arrange each room so that it looks stylish and is easy to move around for prospective buyers. If you haven’t already had a home stylist advise you on this, now is the time to walk through your home with a critical eye. Each room should contain just enough furniture and ornaments to look lived in and liveable, and no more.

Ensure that the lounge suite is arranged nicely (including artfully strewn cushions), that floor rugs are lying correctly, and that beds are neatly made. Anything left on display, such as ornaments and photos, bathroom items, anything on your bedside table, or on your kitchen bench, should be lined up neatly and arranged in small balanced groups. Straighten up any pictures, as well as drapes and blinds.

Even if you’ve been able to fit a desk and a bookshelf into your bedroom to double as a study area, to prospective buyers this can make the room look crowded. Also make sure buyers on inspection day can move easily around your home without having to push their way around awkwardly placed furniture.

5. Lock up valuables

These days people tend to have to give their contact details before they visit a property that is open for inspection. But there’s no point tempting sticky-fingered guests by leaving out jewellery, electronic equipment or valuable ornaments. The person showing prospective buyers through the property can’t keep an eye on every single person in every single room. And if something does go missing, chasing up every single visitor after a suspected theft is not what you — or your agent — want to be spending time doing.

Hiding your valuables out of sight in drawers or the back of a cupboard is probably enough to deter most opportunistic thieves. Store anything really valuable at the home of a trusted friend, or even in a safety deposit box. Be discreet with information that can too closely identify you or your family members. Don’t leave phone numbers or identity cards (and definitely not credit cards) lying around.

6. Freshen up smells

Bad odours are another big put-off for prospective buyers. You don’t want people walking around your home with a wrinkled nose puzzling over a strange smell. Ideally your home should have little or no smell at all — but if you have issues with damp, or you have pets, you may need to resort to masking a bad odour.

Well before inspection time, open your doors and windows to get as much fresh air into the property as you can. (This may of course not be a great idea if you live close to a busy road, or a smelly factory.) If there are still lingering bad or musty smells, around an hour before inspection time you can either spray some air freshener in the rooms, or use some essential oils to freshen it up. Stick to more neutral smells; vanilla is always good. Don’t overdo it — the idea is to neutralise stale or musty smells rather than overpower visitors with a heady fragrance.

7. Bring in light

Maximise natural light in your home by ensuring the windows are absolutely sparkling clean. You’ll be surprised how much light can be reduced by dust and spots on glass. Remove heavy drapes or blinds if they’re cutting out the available light (you can put them back once you’ve sold the property). You may decide to put in a skylight or an extra window to give extra light to a very gloomy room or corner.

On inspection day, turn on lights in the property — even if it’s sunny outside. Use table or standard lamps to create attractive pools of light. Overhead lights can also be used if a room is otherwise quite dark, or to illuminate special features.

8. Make it warm (or cool)

A warm home gives the impression that it’s lived in and loved. Even if it’s not too cold outside, put the heating on for an hour or so before inspection time just to take the edge off (especially if you’ve been airing the home beforehand). If you have one, a lit fire or gas heater can create a sense of cosiness in a lounge-room or family area.

On hot days, run the air-conditioning if you have it. But only to a level that is refreshing rather than chilly. You may also need to open windows if your home is very stuffy.

9. Place flowers and personal touches

A vase of lovely flowers or two can really lift a room and give it a touch of class. Use whatever is in season in a single colour, or at most two, to complement the colour scheme of the room. Avoid very highly scented flowers. Place one vase in the entrance if you can, and at least another in the living area.

Should you have teacups artfully arranged on the dining table, slippers poking out from under the bed, the smell of freshly brewed coffee wafting through the kitchen? These touches can come across as being a bit stagey and contrived. But an arty book or magazine lying on the coffee table may be a nice detail, and do have fresh towels hanging in the bathroom and fresh tea towels in the kitchen — colour-coordinated, of course.

10. Make yourself scarce

On inspection days you and your family, including the family dog, need to do a disappearing act — usually for half an hour at a time. Have a timetable for each inspection time so everyone is aware of the need to get ready and in the car and out the door well before the prospective buyers turn up. Clear away kids’ toys, pet toys and feeding bowls.

Where should you go? You can visit a friend, drop in to a nearby cafe, or do the shopping. If you really can’t be bothered going too far, you could just park the car out of sight up the street. This can give you the chance to stickybeak at who is coming to visit your property. But be discreet; no one wants to feel like they’re under observation during an inspection.

Karin Derkley is a the former deputy editor of Personal Investor magazine, and continues to write for The Age and AFR Smart Investor. She has also lived through the pleasures and pitfalls of purchasing and renovating her own home. She is the author of Selling Your Home for Dummies, published by Wiley. The Dummies brand is celebrating its 21st anniversary in Australia in March. This is an excerpt from Selling Your Home for Dummies.