You Have 15 Seconds to Sell Your Home! 11 Steps You Can Take to Sell Your Home for Top Dollar

Selling your home? Here are some suggestions to help you sell yours for more than your next door neighbor's, and faster! Most buyers will know within 15 SECONDS after crossing the threshold if they want your home. But first, you need to attract them inside!

11 steps to take to sell your home for top dollar

1. Start at the street. The buyer's first glimpse of your home must entice them inside. Design Psychology goes further than mere curb appeal. Here are some easy additions you can make to help your home outshine the competition:

Add a couple of BIG plants, either in hanging baskets or pots, to the porch, which will lead buyers' eyes to the entrance.

The first color our eyes process is yellow, so place yellow flowers near the front door.

Plant white flowering annuals, since they look clean and show up better at night.

2. Get rid of brown or dead leaves and bare spots in the yard. Add mulch to cover bare dirt near the house. Bright flowers hold the eye and "fill" empty areas, but you don't need to add plants to every space. Just make sure that everything looks neat.

3. Paint your front door a happy color. Yellow-gold (amber), red (blue-based), sage, apple, or forest green, depending on the other colors of your home, will attract the eye and create happy feelings. Buyers won't notice the Color Psychology you're employing, but they'll love the result.

4. Once buyers step inside the front door, they usually make their minds up within 15 SECONDS, so first impressions are vitally important. Focus your attention on the first wall buyers will see, and then hang a mirror on that wall large enough to reflect the buyer's image. It will psychologically reinforce the buyer's presence in the home when they see themselves in the mirror, causing them to imagine living in your home.

5. Go beyond just clearing clutter, and remove furnishings that don't add to the setting. Also clear bathroom and kitchen countertops. Under-furnished homes let the buyer's imagination fill rooms with their own belongings. Once they visualize their favorite chair in a particular spot, you have a sale.

6. Pack away your personal photographs, trophies, diplomas, and small accessories and stack them neatly in the garage or a separate storage space. That will also protect you from having strangers view your personal life.

7. If your home looks too bare, replace your personal treasures with house plants or cuttings from the garden. Be creative.

Use tree branches and fresh flowers to bring nature indoors.

Fill vases and glass jars with fresh cuttings and set them in baskets.

Add green house plants in winter, spring, and fall.

During hot selling seasons, use green, silver and gray foliage to help keep your home visually cool.

8. Lighting affects emotions and is a crucial design element for happiness, so turn on the lights when showing your home. Day-like light bulbs enhance happiness. Amber and pink light bulbs warm, while blue light cools.

9. Air the house out. You get used to odors, but buyers shouldn't smell anything other than natural pleasing scents like wood burning in the fireplace or fresh lemon in the summer. Cut up a grapefruit and run sections through the garbage disposal. It's both refreshing and clean smelling.

10. Buyers like temperatures around 70 degrees in the winter and 67 degrees in the summer, so turn up the thermostat in the winter and turn it down in the summer.

11. Park your car out of the way and encourage buyers to park in a space where their car won't block the view.

Remember, you've only got 15 seconds to sell your home, but by using Design Psychology techniques, you can convert lookers into buyers and get top dollar for your home.

(c) Copyright 2004, Jeanette J. Fisher. All rights reserved.

Professor Jeanette Fisher, author of Doghouse to Dollhouse for Dollars, Joy to the Home, and other books teaches Real Estate Investing and Design Psychology. For more articles, tips, reports, newsletters, and sales flyer template, see http://www.doghousetodollhousefordollars.com/pages/5/index.htm