Selling house - 5 things you would do to improve saleability

[Madmog]

As a matter of interest (and just wondering what others think is important), if you were going to put your house on the market in the next 2/3 months, what five improvements would you do. At the moment I'm trying to de-clutter, then paint conservatory (got a bit dirty as cats like it in there), paint kitchen (as we had new boiler last year and you can see old wallpaper at side where it's a different size), plan to try and get mould marks off conservatory blinds and tidy the garden.

Clean the carpets.
Remove all crap / clutter from kitchen work tops.

-Get rid of anything that makes the house look tired/run down.
-Tidy any slightly unfinished DIY jobs (paintwork, any holes to be filled etc)
-Agree about clean carpets (but would add curtains and windows to that)
-Change the bathroom (as the one in our house is shocking)
-weed the garden

I think you are doing the right things OP.

Decluttering is key.
Freshen everything up.
YY to finish off DIY jobs!
Make it look inviting from the street.
Also make sure rooms have a defined purpose iykwim? eg if there is a dining room, make sure buyers can see that you can comfortably fit a table and x chairs in etc.

I've moved more times than i care to remember, so have gathered many ideas along the way. My top 5 would be:

Clean the windows
Agree about making it look inviting from the street, otherwise they won't even come through the door.
Get rid of anything non-essential, to make it as spacious as possible.
Concentrate on bathrooms and kitchens (clean grout, limescale free taps etc)
Repaint any tired looking rooms, it's such a cheap way to freshen the place up - neutral colours, naturally (you can tell I watch too many home makeover/ selling programmes, but it does make sense)

Thanks for your replies - any more are still welcome. Luckily we've had the place totally re-carpeted in the last 3 years and are still removing our shoes when coming through the front door, so they are pretty good. We've had a couple of spillages but have managed to clean these up successfully. Hadn't thought about cleaning windows or cleaning grout, but will add these to the list when we've finished the rest!

Depending on what windows or front door you have paint it. Have a tidy front garden if you one no dead plants in plant pots or overgrown bushes etc.

Tidy garden up if you have one.

We decluttered completely (moved a lot of "personal" stuff that wasn't needed immediately to my mother's)

Repainted front door and washed concrete pillars in wall outside to remove moss.

Removed all marks on wall where we weren't repainting with a magic sponge

Rearranged furniture to maximise feeling of space

definitely make sure the house is as clean, I'm not saying yours isn't by the way, but I've been viewing properties recently and when I seen a grubby house I always thought "if they can't be bothered to clean I bet they haven't maintained the place either". It doesn't have to be completely spotless but dirty grouting, grubby hobs etc is a definite negative buying signal to me or at least will make me bargain very hard. I have just had an offer accepted on a property which in my view has been let go by the owners in the last couple of years. I'm paying 50k under asking, about 12%, in a market that is still moving reasonably well, well presented properties are going for asking in about a week. I'm not saying that the 50k off is all because of a dirty loo but the place had been on the market for a while and the owners really wanted to move on, better presented I'm sure it would have sold much quicker and for a better price.

Some of these may be controversial!

Declutter and put a load of stuff into temp storage
Put away (for viewings) personal photos - you want the house to say 'you could live here'
Fresh flowers in a vase and fresh herbs on the kitchen windowsill
Crisp, white bedding (esp main bedroom) for viewings
Numerous bottles of shower gel, kids' bath toys, etc removed from bathroom (for viewings) and replaced with one single bottle of naice stuff
Kerb appeal - spotless from the front (a lot of people will drive past and peek), maybe paint the front door and shine the letterbox, etc
Think light, bright, spacious!

It may seem overkill (and actually takes bloody ages to do - flowers, herbs, cleaning, tidying, painting, naice bedding on, skanky toiletries hidden away) but we sold in 2009 (when market was hideous for sellers) for asking price - when all estate agents told us to accept 10-20k below that.

Never moving again!

What's with the white bedding? Not sure I know anyone with white bedding! Ours is lovely and fairly neutral but not white?

Haha! Just that it's posh and swanky - you're selling the lifestyle not just the house (now I sound ridic!) Ditto the flowers and herbs - it's inspirational (or something). I guess hotel bedding is usually white?

Um....we have white bedding. Love it.
(Also DH has severe dustmite allergy so have to boil wash everything at 60 degrees so plain white bedding can survive it)

Clear away clutter indoors and in spaces such as the garage or sheds, when we visited our current home there was so much junk everywhere we almost pulled out thinking the house would be too small! The other factor being that if tou do move then you'll want to declutter anyway.

Tidy front (kerb appeal) with clean front door, if you have gravel take out weeds and touch up paint work.

Make sure bathrooms and kitchen are clean and hoover, sadly we discovered that the evident lack of housework was indeed linked to poor house maintenance.

Clean carpets if badly stained, and repaint any particularly tired walls.