Selling empty house should I 'dress' it or leave it empty?

GardenMillie

I would always dress a house when selling it, you only need to watch House Doctor to see how little imagination people have. If a bedroom is advertised as a double it's better to see it with a double bed in etc.

Flowers always help and as much natural daylight as possible, make sure all the windows are sparkling.

Good luck.

aurora_borealis_2

I bought an empty house but I think that the space is deceiving. Empty houses look a lot smaller, I think.

jockettuk

its ok having fresh flowers but if your not visiting your empty house on a regular basis those flowers aint gonna be fresh for long.. dressing a house is great if you can afford it, my oh bought his house and we split the suite as it is so he got one and i got another, so my house half empty as it is as the spare bed went down for my daughter.

I enquired abt renting furniture and was quoted anything from £250 and £500 per month this is way above my budget.. im in no hurry to sell the house but would be nice to get it sold and finalised but in the meantime its somewere to put my weary head when visiting camp bed in hand lol

Triker

Thanks for all the replies and suggestions, I will have to see what the practicalities of taking stuff back to my house are. Admittedly though I'd love to put in a few key pieces of furniture, I'll only have to remove them again if and when it sells. So I'm a bit stuck.....will keep you posted.

Doozergirl

It's only worth dressing if you can go the whole hog and make it look like a home. A few pieces of furniture dotted around make it look like either an ex-rental or a 'lick of paint and bit of furniture' property developer.

What is most important when selling an empty house is that the paintwork is good, holes are filled and everything is clean for people to easily see themselves plonking their own furniture down and moving right in.

PS. I'd definately see what the initial feedback is like before you even consider humping stuff around.

annie-c

I accept that an empty house doen't necessarily signal that the vendor is desperate, but it does indicate that someone is likely to be paying a mortgage without getting any benefit - and so in these instances it seems worth a buyer putting in a lower bid than the asking price, on the off-chance.

That is what I did when I bought my home. I viewed it - it looked a mess, unloved and unlived in and so I reduced the price I was willing to pay - and they accepted because clearly no-one else was willing to pay the full asking price either.


So, if I were you I would take no chances and dress the house (as cheaply as possible).

You might want to try your local freecycle group for free secondhand furniture, and your local charity shop for curtains, bedding etc. These days people give away really, really good quality stuff!

Of course, you can then give it all away again once your house is sold!

Doozergirl

Cheap or clearly second-hand, mismatched furniture is not going to do anything for the saleability of your house at all!

It's easy enough to scale down what you currently live with and move it back to the house you're selling, but it's still virtualy impossible to make it look like a home without it actually being one or having a budget to rival the big housebuilders!

Triker

Ummm it's a sticky one, I now happen to live about 250 miles away from the house and I do wish to sell but I'm not desperate, if that makes sense. I could look at renting but need to be extra careful re capital gains. I may just go with the empty and clean option. It may be a 'try it and see what happens' scene.

Rakesh.Chauhan_2

Why not just buy furniture from Argos, let people view the flat and just before the 14day period of buying the stuff from Argos is over, return it and get your money back

Triker

Rakesh.Chauhan wrote:

Why not just buy furniture from Argos, let people view the flat and just before the 14day period of buying the stuff from Argos is over, return it and get your money back

Hi there, thanks for the suggestion but I don't have the money to buy very much and because my house is so far away it'd be a lot of messing about but thanks anyway.