Prepping house for sale

[bathsh3ba]

My aim is to get our house on the market by end Feb. I'm a single mum, two kids, I've basically got half term and a weekend to do it, and very limited extra money. We are aiming to move to a smaller house in the nearby city - being rural is not working for us now my kids are older.

It's a four bed extended semi in a desirable village but it's not one of the desirable houses as it's a 1950s semi rather than one of the listed cottages. The big sell really is space, and that it was recently extended so kitchen/bathrooms/boiler etc are new.

Houses in the village are selling within about 3 months mostly.

My basic aim has been to do a deep clean of carpets, kitchen etc, touch up paintwork and try to declutter. The back garden is a bit of a mess but I can't afford to get someone in to sort it out, the front garden looks fine.

Any tips/things I might be missing or not think of? Also, what do you do with the clutter you've boxed up?! I'm clearing out what I can, e.g. old toys/clothes but there will still be boxes of stuff we want to keep but I don't want on display.

Finally, I have an old cat who needs a litter tray. I refresh it often but I can't take it away during the day if there is a viewing as she would just do her business where it used to be, which would be worse! How can I minimise the extent to which this puts people off? She does the classic cat thing of using it as soon as I put fresh litter in so it would be very hard to make sure it was unused.

Cut the grass in the back garden (if needed strim it first) - you can get away with a lot if the grass is cut. Any old children's toys etc out there bin or give away. Same with any old garden furniture. Maybe pop 2 garden chairs out in a spot to give the illusion you use it.

The cat...is there anywhere she can go on a viewing day? A shed with the litter tray briefly, the utility, car boot or a friend's house? Personally I like to see a cat in a house - but the litter tray isn't the best impression. We viewed one house where they'd locked the cats and litter tray in a very small utility room with a sign saying don't open. That the estate agent didn't notice and did open. The cats and the smell exploded out.

You can get covered litter trays - but really if you can kindly move her out for an hour that might be better.

Clutter - one house we viewed which was beautiful - I only twigged had no storage when I peeked in the garage and realised it was absolutely chock full of everything.

Do you have family or friends with an attic. Can you put some of it in the car and park round the corner for the duration?

Stuff - Don't worry too much and pack up as much as you can tidily - most people can see beyond that if it's tidy....

I put quite a bit in my car, and just parked it further it down the road. Putting stuff in the attic is a bit of a faff, but depends how much you have.

I would never relegate my cat to a shed or outhouse for viewings. House viewers will not be taking on your cat or litter tray so like decor, they can just ignore. As long as the litter tray os clean, nothing wrong with leaving it there. It certainly didn’t stop my house selling.

A clean litter tray I would agree isn't a problem - if you can time the viewings round your cat's ablutions.

Take photos of your rooms - it's much easier to see problems in a photo than in real life. If you're feeling brave put them on here, you'll get loads of advice.

Clear out as much as you can. Have you a garage you can store boxes in? Have nice new towels/tea towels and soaps handy to put out for viewing use only. Limit all to 1 coat out on rack each so it doesn't look like no space for coats with hooks over flowing. In back garden cut grass and clear away any broken pots/kids toys. Has someone a power washer you can use to clean any slabs up with?