To think you ought to tidy to a reasonable basic standard before people come to view your house?

[LeapingUpstream]

Trying to settle a debate with DH. I'm not talking about making it look show-home perfect, I'm talking about making it look like a reasonably tidy and welcoming, albeit lived-in home.

YANBU: A basic level of cleanliness/ tidiness is both expected and kind of important to actually selling the place.

YABU: No, it's fine to let people look round whatever state it's in, even if the master bedroom floor is mostly invisible. (And therefore leaving it in said state for your heavily pregnant and not-very-well wife who can't currently bend over to deal with, having done nothing about it all weekend, despite saying you would, is totally acceptable. And she's being the unreasonable one for thinking it ought to be tidy and for being stressed and upset that it isn't.)

😡

This! Not workable space etc, no room for clothes.
we recently moved and the absolute hell hole houses were an immediate no. When you can’t pick your way round to see out the windows why bother looking roun the rest of it.
one house said we couldn’t look in loft or shed, we took our asking price offer off the table

When we sold our house it was in pristine condition where possible (as in, we couldn't update the old kitchen but you could eat off the benches they were so clean). Generally I don't like going anywhere that's not clean but it would make me feel unfavourable about a house I was viewing. Or I'd think ' They just want a quick sale so put in a lowball offer'.

I'd be ordering a litter picker from amazon so you don't have to bend over and just putting everything he owns that's on the floor in a black bin bag and shoving it in his wardrobe, car boot, garage.

I would concentrate on teaching the kids to tidy up after themselves, that will be of more use when a baby comes and hopefully you move house.

If they are willing to consider what special toys they have that they are too big for and want to give as a present to their new baby brother or sister, it's a good way to get them to help weed through toys and box them up.

Selling a house is exhausting trying to keep everything tidy. Much easier in a sellers market which this isn't. If it's not madly urgent then maybe take it off the market until next year and hope that things improve. If you want to keep it on the market then perhaps agree which days of the week you can facilitate bookings so that the EA doesn't put you at everyone's beck and call.

Back to school soon, that will make things easier.

Maybe it's my respectable working class roots but I would certainly never want to give it to be said that I kept my house in that state. It is a matter of both self respect but also respect for the other person who is coming to view. You expect them to come and view and potentially spend hundreds of thousands on your home and you can't put your dirty clothes in a hamper? One of the saddest thing I ever saw was when I viewed a house lived in by an elderly person who had died. The children selling it - so making pure profit - didn't even have the decency to clear away the man's medicines and eye glasses and personal bits and bobs from the bed side locker. I felt like we were violating this man's privacy in some way and I cannot imagine he would have wanted a crowd of strangers trooping through his life long home gawping at it.

But if it’s ok to live in it like that day to day then why not ok to show people round?

I wouldn’t run around cleaning for viewings as I cant live in a space I would be embarrassed for others to see.

I understand your other half’s point of view- why make extra effort for total strangers if you all can’t be bothered to make the effort for yourselves?

and btw at least your ten year old is trying to help you- calling them incompetent is mean as fuck

If I viewed a messy house where I could not see the bedroom floor, dh and I would probably beat a hasty retreat and would be talking about it for days but not in a good way.

He doesn't believe that the house should be untidy when it's viewed. He just doesn't want to tidy the house. Its weaponised incompetence.

Untidy people don't mind viewing a tidy house. Tidy people really don't want to view a untidy house.

You DH will not be able to find a single article which supports his alleged view.

I make my house show home ready every single time because I wanted to sell after finding my dream home .. every single person commented how lovely the. Presentation was to the EA so I'm guessing a lot of people don't bother but I have pride and I'd hate someone to think I was grubby ! ( I am not so unlikely I guess )

It sold after a few viewings so I think it definitely helps

If I can't see what I'm buying I won't make an offer because I need to be able to see the floors, kitchen sideboards etc. The mess could be hiding something. Tell him to get off his lazy arse and clean it up.

Your husband doesn't sound very nice OP.

You're heavily pregnant and ill and looking after 2 other DC.

What an arsehole.

The husband and the house are different issues. I once went to the very cluttered cottage extended into a house to buy an exclusive guitar for my son's 18th. But it was a large and very desirable house with middle class clutter. They clearly had enough space and storage but were too caught up with erudite concerns to clear and clean. Seriously they had a 12 foot dining table that the seller had to push an A4 space into it was so cluttered. Working class clutter on a new build estate is not desirable.

I would have bought the cluttered house in a heartbeat if I won the lottery.

By the time the EA and I reached the bedroom I'd already decided that this place wasn't for me. She opened the door to the very messy bedroom and the oaf turned over in his sleep - so we just left!

😂that estate agent had their work cut out!

I'm not a tidy person by any means, I keep the house clean but I have far too much stuff and clutter I'm not always the best at putting things away, we have limited storage that doesn't help. However I would not want people to come and view my house and it being a mess, so I'd make an effort to looking as presentable as possible for people coming to view it.

And it was around midday - not like we'd turned up unexpectedly at 09.00!

No, the older two are his as well. And to be fair he's a good, hands-on dad and usually does a reasonable amount in the house. And he's keener on selling than I am, though I agree we need to. I just didn't want to be faffing with it while heavily pregnant/ dealing with a newborn, but external life circumstances are kind of dictating it happens now 🤷🏻‍♀️.
We've also sold twice before, and both times he was 'normal' about it - ie agreed the place needed to be clean and tidy, and helped to make sure it was! He just seems to have had some sort of brain fart this time, and his reaction to me getting in a state about how much needs doing and my (relative) inability to do it is to tell me that I'm being silly thinking it needs tidying! 🤯

😨 I remember looking round someone's house and they had to get Grandma out of bed. It was an 8pm viewing, but the owners could have rescheduled! I did feel awful for her.

I disagree with you both.

When having viewings it should look like a show home. Every agent I've worked with has said that and I've sold three homes now, and in two days each.

When you sell a house you sell a lifestyle.

You make it harder to make that new life attractive because people can't imagine themselves living in someone else's clutter.

They want to be able to imagine their life in your home.

He's abdicating responsibility for some reason. Maybe because he doesn't want to move, or he can't cope with the process of tidying and throwing things out or because he's lazy.

Regardless, you will find it harder to sell and that will affect how much you sell for, and then the future you have.

If someone said put £10,000 in the bin or tidy the kitchen what's the response you give? Cos that's what he's doing.

When I had my flat valued I was very late getting home from work and had only tidied the top half. I'm pretty messy but not filthy - the estate agent changed his estimate by £10,000 after seeing both halves. That tells me it matters.

On the point of the 10yo - I have obviously not called him incompetent to his face! He is a sweetheart and I'm very aware he's trying to help and have told him I'm very grateful, which I am. He just has an unerring ability to cause a trail of destruction wherever he goes unless heavily supervised and/ or embarks on side quests on the drop of a hat. Eg: putting away food in the kitchen, manages to cascade an entire packet of spaghetti across the floor and doesn't notice he's done it. Sent to tidy his room and twenty minutes later tells me he's finished: has beautifully rearranged his (already tidy) shelf of funko pops, and has got several sets of lego he wants to send to charity out of the cupboard (where they were neatly contained) but still has laundry on the floor and an unmade bed. I'm aware this is all entirely to be expected at his age, but what I mean by incompetent is that he's really not the ideal helper for getting large amounts done in a short space of time!!

easily solved by saying "make your bed and put your laundry in the basket" instead of "tidy your room"

My 14 yo is still like this. Just yesterday he was asked to help by sweeping up the fallen berries at the side of the house. He swept them up beautifully but then had a pile of large red berries to pelt at the fence.
Which now needs jet washing.
And I'm not prepared to let him loose on that.......

We are in the process of moving, both our house and the house we are buying were immaculate for photo's and viewings! I have pets and kids so it was bloody hard going even though it is always pretty clean and tidy anyway, I definitely went the extra mile!!
I had a post on here a while ago when we were viewing properties about some of the shit tips we looked at, my 'favourite' was the one with holes punched in every door and dirty dishes piled up in the sink.....I've just looked and it is still on the market 6 months later.
Obviously people can look past your possessions but why wouldn't you want the best chance of getting the best price for your biggest asset?
Bare minimum in my opinion is tidied, thoroughly cleaned, all windows opened for a few hours for freshness, new fluffy towels in the bathroom (unless yours are already pristine of course). I also changed the beds into fresh linens to avoid that 'slept in' smell in the bedroom, I stripped the sofas and washed the sofa covers to freshen it up as well.
The number of houses we looked at with crumbs everywhere in the kitchen was unbelievable, it would be a 2 minute job to wipe up but they didn't......doesn't bode well for bigger jobs so it put us off as it made the homeowners seem lazy and uninterested in the maintenance of their property.
The house we are buying was beautifully clean, tidy and smelled gorgeous!

I understand your other half’s point of view- why make extra effort for total strangers if you all can’t be bothered to make the effort for yourselves?

Because they're not trying to sell their own house to themselves?

The point of having the house clean and tidy for viewings is simply to show it to its best advantage to someone you're hoping will be persuaded to give you hundreds of thousands of pounds for it.