What makes the house sell?
 

I would definitely go along with enclose the lanai with windows, gutters, solar lights if it is dark inside the house, and priced right.

Remove overgrown shrubs or prune way back. Make sure front door is visible from street and is freshly painted in an inviting color. Pressure wash or paint house/driveway. Walk inside and sniff. Walk through as if you are a buyer. Open closets. Then get rid of 2/3 of your decorations, clothes, and supplies. Then clean until the house smells fresh. Remove heavy curtains to bring in light. Clean windows. If your cabinets look worn, pay a pro to paint them. The more updated your home looks the more money you can expect. Make sure your interior is freshly painted in neutral colors. If you are not capable of doing it yourself, consider hiring someone to stage your home. Right now is THE time to sell. If you try to take on too much and wind up not getting it on the market until the snowbirds leave, it will take longer to sell plus you will get less. We used Remax to sell our home and they were incredible.

Inside decor doesn't matter to me. How old is roof, air conditioner, water heater and windows??? Those are my concerns as a buyer.

Price right - sell by owner; OR outside Realtor
 

TV Realtors will wow you with data, but will not sell your 'used' home. Nope - too busy selling the new stuff.

So do your own research on line, advertise (much of it is free) and sell your home at a 'fair price'. That means maybe lower than the professional listers, but you still take more home as you avoid the commission. Then again TV will list it high to please you and then continue to move the price down - down - down.

IF you just do not want to sell by owner, find a nearby but not in TV realtor. Sign a short term contract with YOUR option to extend. You want to be in charge if they do not perform.

As others have said, be certain your realtor agrees to have professional photos taken. De clutter — get rid of Knick knacks, family photos, extra furniture, etc. Remove clothes from your closets to make them look more spacious. Make your house look like a model home. Put items in storage if you have to.

Definitely neutral colors, NO WALLPAPER, chair height elongated toilets, landscape weeded & bushes trimmed.

Maybe include a golf cart. May just sway a buyer.

The home owner is never objective. We all think our home is wonderful. After all we picked it and filled with thing we like. We have several of our properties on the market now and these are the changes the listing agents wanted:

1. Declutter. Take out all personal photos; remove those treasures displayed on the shelves.

2. All drapes off windows and doors

3. Repaint rooms with non neutral colors

4. Nothing on the kitchen counters

5. Empty out the garage

6. If you have carpet have them cleaned

7. Empty closets to the extent possible

As a Realtor for 25 years I'd say price location and declutter!! Get a storage space if you need to just get stuff out of there!
Also clean!

Location, location, location. Price slightly lower then others, no clutter, no smell. I sold my house in 3 days in a bad market this way. I used to be a realtor years ago. Neutral paint.

Imho ...
 

Oversimplification perhaps, but only one thing will get that buyer: PRICE! Certainly other factors—some already mentioned—play a role, of course, but a home in need of work and/or one in a less-than-ideal location will still sell—at the right price point.

Beginning of this thread has cyv in Duvall

Ohiobuckeye
 

You pretty much put it in a nutshell. We’ve built & sold 14 homes & the only discrepancy we had with all of them was the realtor price some of them to high so we would be sure to go with them. The last one we sold was the worst they came back with an offer from the buyer $45,000. less than what the realtor said it was worth, of course we said absolutely NO. We couldn’t believe that our realtor would even ask if we would take that much, we thought she was working for us not them. We counter offered back $23,000 higher & they took it. So JSR22, if you want to sell our house we’ll hirer you next time!

All of these are good replies. As a former realtor, I totally agree with the over simplified answer PRICE. A realtor is looking for the best commission. You’re looking for a buyer, as quickly as possible. Trust me, price it right and it WILL sell.

You're like me... concerned with the basics that cost a lot of money to replace. Unfortunately, most buyers are just the opposite. They're more concerned with cosmetics and how "pretty" the house looks, never mind the fact that it may look totally different with THEIR stuff in the house.

I'm not saying that a house shouldn't look nice. I'm just saying that when it comes to cost, it can cost a lot more to replace the basic essentials, than it does to make the house look "pretty".