PRAISE THE LORD AND PASS THE PAINTBRUSH

WELCOME

Hey, y’all! I have a fun announcement that coincides with today’s topic. A few weeks ago, I made a video about whether or not to paint the kitchen cabinets. I tell you what, that thing exploded with hundreds of thousands of views. One of the things I said is the subject line of today’s email. What’s funny is that people liked that phrase so much, they insisted I put it on a shirt.

So that is exactly what I did at GlenndaGear… established when Jesus was a baby.

Because that video was a fun topic and appropriate for the spring buying season, today we’re going to talk about quick and easy ways for your sellers to improve their homes to maximize their offers! So let’s go!

STORY TIME WITH GLENNDA

Spring Shape Up

As we head into spring buying season, we’re all eager to do what we can to make our sellers’ homes stand out. That’s why everyone is always asking us, “What kind of improvements can we make to best position our home on the market?”

While I’m fixing to get to the cabinet paint part—and before anyone gets carried away with a full kitchen or bathroom renovation—here’s the most important thing everyone can do:

CLEAN THE DAMN HOUSE.

I’m sure I’m singing to the choir here, but I am talking top to bottom and tip to tail. Now, I suspect everyone thinks they are tidy and neat, but once you live in a home—and we are all guilty of this—we become blind to the dirty parts. For example, I’ll have sellers who are paragons of good housekeeping… and yet they have no idea how much grease has accumulated on the cabinet above their stove. Degreasing your cabinets just isn’t something you think about on a day-to-day basis, regardless of how often you dust, vac, and mop. So get them to get that place deeply, deeply clean.

Y’all… I have never seen condition intolerance like I’ve seen in the past couple of quarters. Everyone wants the shiny new penny house. They want that place to be as crispy as can be. I took some buyers to a listing where the home was an absolute disaster. There was literally dog shit on the floor! How do you not police that up before a showing?? That listing agent did their client such a disservice by not insisting this man (who was in the throes of a divorce and probably some depression, in my experience) have his home professionally serviced. Had they presented a clean palette, they could have gotten another $50K on the asking price.

The next thing your sellers can do to freshen up their home—and for not a lot of money—is to update anything easy that looks worn. Specifically, I’m talking door hardware, outlets, and light switches. These fixes are easy-peasy-lemon-squeeze-y, and it’s something anyone can do. Get rid of those terrible gold door handles and bring in a more contemporary brushed nickel or oil-rubbed bronze. The price is small and the difference is huge and it’s nothing you can’t learn to do in two minutes with a YouTube video.

I’d also recommend addressing those light switches and plate covers. Now, what’s important to note here is that if the outlet itself is yellowed, just replacing the cover with something white is actually going to make it look worse, literally like a wrinkle in the middle of the forehead. So if they’re not handy, suggest they bring in an electrician for an hour and get it done right.

While they’re at it, swap out those nasty, old, dust-filled register covers for something new, especially if they’re rusted. I mean, a fresh, clean 4×10 cover is less than $12 on Amazon.

Your sellers can do all of the above for less than $1000 and it will literally take ten to fifteen years off their place. And, P.S.? We all know they’ll get that money back tenfold.

The next level is doing actual renovations and my caution here is to not do the eye lift without the facelift. Sellers have to be careful because when it comes to, say, a kitchen, they need to remember that the finger is connected to the palm which is connected to the wrist, etc. When you pull one thread, it can impact the whole dang sweater. Like, if they replace the counters without doing something about the cabinets, it’s like putting lipstick on a pig and won’t help your sellers increase their home’s value.

If they’re going to do anything in the kitchen, this is where I recommend painting those cabinets. And paint a color, not just white because white cabinets are like white jeans—they just show every flaw. No one wants the kitchen version of panty-lines going on in there.

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I’d say what is most important to note when it comes to sellers making updates is to FINISH WHAT THEY START. If they’re going to take on a project, bring it to completion, even if that means hiring professionals. When buyers see a home that’s nothing but half-finished, half-assed updates, it’s actually worse than if the seller just left it as-is, as no one’s buying a home so much as they are purchasing a to-do list. But if your sellers are anxious to tackle something quick to fix a dated bathroom, the best thing they can do is to get rid of that plate-glass dance-studio mirror and replace it with something more contemporary.

Something I’m seeing a lot of sellers do is to hand out a capital improvement one-sheet to prospective buyers. This feels like a fairly new practice. But what everyone may not realize is that every document uploaded to the MLS is also that seller telling the county exactly what they did to their house. Not only is that going to potentially impact their tax assessment, it could also create issues if the work wasn’t properly permitted.

This notion segues us into clear cooperation, which we’ll dive into more next week. But the crux of it is, when you put that info into the MLS, it also goes to CoreLogic which feeds to the lenders and the insurance companies. And while it’s not often that I agree with Robert Reffkin, he made some great points against it in Nashville at Inman, so next week, I’ll break that down.

But for now, it’s important that we continue to impress upon our sellers that condition counts for a whole lot these days, yet making little changes can make a big difference to their offers.

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GLENNDA’S GURU

Meet Brad Inman!

Hey, y’all! I am pleased as a pig in a puddle to share this conversation with the one and only Brad Inman!

If you’re thinking, “Wait, Inman like the Inman Group?” the answer is a resounding yes! He is the man behind the organization that provides the news, the branding, and the educational services that our industry simply could not live without. So I hope everyone enjoys our conversation as much as I did!

Thank you, Brad!

Today’s Words of Wisdom

GLENNDA BAKER & ASSOCIATES

It’s a Dang Jewel Box of Possibilities

Oh, my stars and stripes, I have an absolute jewel box of a house here, one that is just a diamond in the rough, smack in the middle of one of Atlanta’s most vibrant neighborhoods.

This prime East Atlanta bungalow is rife with potential, ready to be customized into a space that best suits your style. Plus, there’s an outbuilding that’s basically like a Choose Your Own Adventure book—will you make it a workshop, a carport, or an art studio? The possibilities are limitless!