Luckily, we sold our house quickly, but I thought it might be interesting to share our routine to get and keep our house show worthy at a moments notice.
Right after waking up, I made our bed. This is no different than my usual routine, but I made V’s bed and E’s crib when they woke up, too. Then I got the boys and myself dressed and fed. After breakfast, I vacuumed the whole house. I haven’t vacuumed every day since V was a baby.
Shortly before each showing, the boys and I clean up toys, quickly vacuum if they’ve made any messes, run through the house to look for any problems. I put the toilets lids down, wipe down counters and sinks, and fold towels.
About 1/2 hour before a showing, I took boys out of the house. We had different activities depending on the weather and time of day. If the weather was nice, we’d go for walks in the mornings.
Over E’s nap time, we drove around looking at houses for exterior inspiration or explore the new neighborhood. For showings after 4:00, the boys and I ran to the grocery store, for a walk, or play at the park.
Many of our showings were around the lunch hour, but we did have a few around 10:00 and a few more after work hours.
If you’re getting ready or already trying to sell your house, here’s a list of things have done to get our house ready:
One time:
- Touch up paint or other problem areas. Go through your house as if seeing for the first time. What stands out?
- Scrub floors, fridge, stove, and wash windows.
- Clear the visible clutter. It’s okay if your closets have stuff inside, but not okay to have stacks of paper sitting on the kitchen counter.
- Clean up your yard. The front of the house is a buyer’s first impression, so make it a good one.
Weekly or as needed:
- Clean bathrooms and kitchen.
- Spot clean floors, walls, and windows as necessary.
- Put laundry away. No one wants to see your dirty clothes on the floor.
Daily:
- Make beds.
- Vacuum.
- Clean counters.
- Clear toys, laundry, and clutter.
- Wash dishes, either put dishes in the dishwasher or wash by hand. You don’t have to run the dishwasher, but get the dishes out of the sink.
Before a showing or open house:
- Do daily stuff (make beds, vacuum, etc.).
- Turn on lights, especially accent lighting.
- Remove rugs from bathrooms to show off nice floors.
- Open all curtains.
- Park cars on street to leave drive way open.
- Empty garbage cans.
We try to keep our house as clean as possible regularly, so most of the process was the same or similar to our daily life. The biggest difference was cleaning up toys and vacuuming more frequently. And staying out of the house for undetermined lengths of time. We quickly ran out of errands and often roamed the neighborhood.
Honestly, this was the most difficult part. Even that wasn’t terrible, just a little more planning and daily work than usual. However, the boys thoroughly enjoyed the showing stage. What was most difficult part of the selling for you? Easiest?
P.S. Learn how we marketed our house to sell.
ourhumbleabodeblog.com 
Those are great tips! I’ll have to remember to refer back to this when we sell our house one day.
Did Ben do the showings while you took the boys out?
Hi Kristen! Yep, Ben handled the showings, giving the tour, answering questions, all that jazz while I entertained the boys. It worked well for us.
Thanks!
Amanda
Thanks for the tips. Those were great. I helped my sister sell her house years ago and I did the same things. It is kind of nerve racking making sure everything is “perfect”.
Would you explain how you knew what price point to sell your house and how did you weed out the looky loos to make sure that potential buyers could afford your home?
Thanks!
absolutely LOVE the tips! I pinned them for safe keeping for later in case we ever decide to sale— we’ll definitely try a for sale by owner route!
PS- YOU GUYS ROCK! Congrats on the sale!
Congrats!
I’ll never forget the stress of the first time I had to sell a home… We were in NYC, so an agent was required, and we were not allowed in our apartment during the showings.
The stress of keeping everything magazine perfect (getting up before the sun to scrub daily, hide our personal effects, and keep our teeny closets looking abundant) combined with the curiosity of what people thought of our place (Do they hate the chandelier I made? Are they allergic to our cats?! Can they notice that we ran out of paint and had to get a new gallon that didn’t 1000% match??) just about killed me!
If we ever do it again,I hope I’ll be more relaxed!
Hi Monique! The first few days were nerve wracking, then it became part of our routine. Now it’s nice to slack on that again. 🙂 As far as pricing, I’ve got that info in today’s post. 🙂 We didn’t do much to weed out the buyers from the lookers. I think getting anyone in the door is better than no one. And you never know, maybe the house isn’t a right fit for those people, but could be for their friends or family. Or maybe their agent has a client to show it to. Sure we had a few people who were looking for a fixer upper (which there isn’t much of in our house) or it was different than they maybe thought, but two of those agents scheduled showings with different buyers. I think more serious buyers will schedule a showing where open houses are for the curious neighbors.
Hey Ashley, Thanks!! So glad I might be able to help. 😉
Hi Dina! Oh yes, isn’t it stressful? I took down the lights I made. I showed them to our buyer and asked if she would be interested in keeping the lights. Turns out, she liked two of the three. 🙂 It was easier to take them down and we can put them back up now, but people got to look more at the house and less at changeable things.
Thanks!
Amanda