When you are after a quick home sale one of the most important things to realize about any future buyer, is that for them the decision to buy your home is more of an emotional decision than it is a logical one. Naturally the future buyers won’t throw out logic altogether, but it does mean that they will allow their emotion’s to influence the final decision making process more so than their logic. Therefore your home must appeal effectively to the buyer’s emotions as well as simply to their practical side. But how do you start to make your property appeal to the emotions of your potential buyers?
You’ll have heard the expression “the first impression is a lasting impression” – it’s true — therefore the first thing your future buyers are going to see is the front yard and the front of the home. So, the first big emotional ploy is to “give your front some grunt”. Realtor-speak for getting your first impression right is “creating curb appeal”. Great curb appeal gets your selling opportunity off to a flying start. If you can create the ‘wow factor’ from the outset, so that folks really start to anticipate that they are going to like your house you are already on a winning ticket. Right from the moment they first drive up to your home they will be hooked. Having a high curb appeal means that selling your home becomes a lot easier as buyers tend to overlook small things (their ‘emotions’ start to take over and resolve minor niggles that could otherwise have become potential ‘objections’ to purchase). The good news is that creating curb appeal is not all that hard:
First off, make sure your yard is kept ‘well manicured’ and appears tidy, clean and cared for. Neat edging of the driveway and sidewalks carries your prospect’s eyes right on up to the front door of your home. The front exterior walls of the home then become the next major focal point for your potential buyer..
Typically the buyers will be checking out the exterior walls and whether or not the place looks in good order. Therefore you need to ensure that the exterior walls, at least, have been power washed and if necessary given a fresh coat of paint. In fact color is high on the list of “key emotional triggers” and a major factor in creating great curb appeal. Choose colors with care for any repainting as it can make or break the “curb appeal” of your home.
Remember that you will be repainting for the future buyers not yourself. You will have to set aside your own personal taste and think in terms of what will appeal to a buyer. However, since you don’t know what any one prospect will like it is safest to choose what is known as a “universal color”. The color should blend well with the other homes in the neighborhood. It may be that the color that appealed to you when you bought the home was just perfect (it may even have been the trigger that led YOU to buy!). If you have been a bit ‘indulgent’ with any repaint in the interim, be prepared to go back to safe, sound, basic, light and simple colors that harmonize with the surroundings rather than fight against it, for a more certain positive appeal.
A simple way to help you select the right base colors and accent colors, for maximum “curb appeal” is to use a color matching chart. You can pick up a selection of such charts from most good paint or DIY stores. You could also take a sample of the original colors of your home down to your local paint store and, if they are worth their salt, they should also be able to advise you about the best contemporary colors and also help you to choose matching colors perfectly.
It is critical to maximize the “curb appeal” of your home as it is the first emotional trigger, or hot-button, that your prospect will be turned on by. Getting this right, like successful foreplay, will start to get your buyer panting for more, and if the interior of your property also continues to tickle-their-fancy in the right way, you could soon be en route to achieving that satisfying climax of a quick home sale.
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