I’ve talked about things you can do for yourself when preparing your house for sale, but some jobs are just too big to take on alone. Since I’m a handyman here in the Asheville area, I thought I’d offer a list of 6 ways a guy like me can help you get your house ready for sale. 1) A Walk-Through. This is probably the best service you can get from a good handyman: a walk-through of your home to help you decide what needs to be fixed. Even if you don’t hire a handyman, get a friend to walk through the house with you to make a checklist of things to fix up or clean before you put it on the market. You need someone who can look at your house with a detached eye and see the things you overlook from habit. After all, your buyer will see the house for the first time, and they will see many things you no longer notice. 2) Fixing Holes and Repainting. It’s easy enough to touch up the paint on your house, but if your walls have lots of little holes and dents, you might want to call in a professional to patch over all the little blemishes. Professional painters are also faster and neater than many amateurs, which makes a difference when you’re in a hurry to get your house ready to sell. 3) Patching Your Floor. If you’re planning to replace or repair the flooring in a large area, it’s best to call in a flooring specialist; but specialists often don’t want to do small jobs. For example, if you’ve got an older hardwood floor, you’ve probably noticed that it’s getting worn in high-traffic areas such as the spot just in front of the door. Replacing bits of flooring takes skill if you want to do it seamlessly, so hire it out to a handyman. 4) Replacing Faucets, Door Knobs and Locks. If you’re handy with a screwdriver or a pair of pliers, and you can read directions, you can probably replace these items yourself. But this kind of work can seem intimidating, especially with the more complicated locks. That’s when you should call a handyman. 5) Touching Up the Tub. You may not realize it, but your house is constantly in motion—very limited motion—due to changes in humidity and temperature. One thing that often moves a little bit is your bathroom wall; this often leaves an ugly little gap between the tub and the wall. Get your handyman to refresh the caulk line and brighten up the bathtub. 6) Replacing Appliances, Light Fixtures and Ceiling Fans. I’m not a huge fan of new appliances—those fancy electronic models seem to require more repairs than the old ones—but many home buyers like to see an updated kitchen and laundry area. Our local “big box” hardware store no longer offers appliance installation, so unless you can install your new fixtures yourself, you’ll need to call a handyman or appliance specialist. This is really just a short list of the many ways a good handyman can help you. As I mentioned in the beginning, the most important thing you can get from a handyman is a fresh set of eyes to see what your house might need in order to look its best. Need a little help making your “to do” list? If you’re in Asheville, give me a call.
I’ve talked about things you can buy to improve your curb appeal, but you don’t have to spend a dime to make your house buyer-ready. In fact, this is a great time for Elbow Grease. Here are 12 exterior details you should clean up before you sell your house: 1) The yard. Mow the lawn, rake the leaves, and sweep the dirt off the sidewalks. But you already knew that. 2) Your siding. Does your house have dirt or mold on its siding? Now is the time to scrub it. If you can’t do it with elbow grease, get it pressure-washed. 3) Bee nests. You don’t want your potential buyers to be racing away from your house while desperately swatting at the wasps they disturbed when they opened the back door, do you? Now is the time to check for surprises. 4) Cobwebs. Not only should you get rid of active infestations, but you should also clean up any other debris under the eaves and in windowsills, such as cobwebs or abandoned nests. 5) Outdoor lights. These are magnets for dead bugs, aren’t they? Clean up those lights and make them shine. Dust off the blades on your porch fan while you’re at it. 6) Porch furniture. You’re probably past the age where you keep a stuffed easy chair on the porch (although I confess I would still do it if my wife would let me get away with it.) But is your porch furniture clean? Maybe it’s time to scrub or repaint it. 7) Doodads. Just as you want to reduce interior clutter, you should keep the doodads to a minimum. Pink flamingos and whirligigs are great, but their appeal is not universal. 8) The carport. Somehow junk always seems to pile up in a carport, but unlike garages, carports don’t hide the things within them. If possible, keep your carport completely empty. Let your buyers park there. 9) Moss on the roof. Unless you are a hobbit, you really shouldn’t have moss on the roof. It grows into the shingles and decays them. If you have a lot of moss on the roof, it’s probably time to re-roof your house. If there’s just a little moss, you can kill it with a solution of equal parts bleach and water. (Be careful not to get bleach on yourself or your shrubs). 10) Under the house. Your buyers might not look under your house, but their home inspector certainly will. Clean out any debris and make it accessible. Better yet, lay down fresh plastic underlayment if it’s within your budget. 11) Windows. Some say the eyes are the windows of the soul, but I might add that windows are the eyes of the house. Wash the windows and their sills, even on the upper stories if you can. 12) Window wells. If your basement has windows with “wells” to keep out debris, make sure they are cleaned out. As you prepare to sell your house, take a long look at the outside. Make sure it looks as fresh and clean as possible. After all, it’s the first thing your buyers will see. Need help sprucing up? Call your local Asheville handyman.
As a handyman, I am often called on to spruce up my clients’ houses and get them ready to sell. I also spend my free time fixing up historic homes and then reselling them. Therefore, I have a special interest in improvements that can raise a property value without costing a lot. In the next few posts, I’m going to share different ways to improve your property value, with a focus on getting your house ready to sell. Some of these things are free, some are cheap, and some are moderately expensive but very worthwhile. Now, on to today’s list: 8 Ways to Get Curb Appeal for Under $1001) It’s all in the numbers. Your potential buyers are going to be creeping down your road and squinting at the street numbers, trying to figure out which one is yours. Why not impress them at first sight with a clean, legible set of house numbers in a prominent place? 2) Pay attention to the plants. Mulch your garden beds and put in some cheap annuals. Hang a few ferns on the porch. Mow the lawn and keep it watered. Cut the dead limbs off of the trees. All of these things are inexpensive, but they all make a big difference. 3) Repaint your front door. Entrance doors take a lot of abuse. They get kicked; they get slammed; they get scraped by keys. Cover all of that up with a new coat of paint. By the way, if the “real” main entrance is the side door, paint that, too. 4) Get a new mailbox. Or at least repaint your old one. 5) Put out the welcome mat. This is important for two reasons: for one thing, it will set a good impression. For another thing, lots and lots of people are going to troop through your house. Give them all a place to scrape the dirt off their feet. Remember, you can take this improvement with you to your next place, so it’s okay to splurge. Get a sturdy one that will still look good a month from now. 6) Change the locks early. Most people change the locks when they move into a new place, not when they sell. But take a look at the knobs and locks on your exterior doors. Are they scratched or dated? Paint them or replace them. It’s not that expensive, and it sets a nice impression. 7) Hide the eyesores. Do you have ugly trashcans, rambling woodpiles or crumbling heaps of compost? Hide them with a simple privacy screen such as a trellis. 8) Freshen up bad paint. Check the windowsills and exterior paint, especially in damp places or places that get lots of sunshine. It’s common for exterior paint to chip and peel, and it’s easy to scrape it and repaint it. (Use care if scraping very old paint chips; they can contain lead.) You don’t have to spend the big bucks to make your house appealing from the street. A little loving maintenance can go a long way. Need an Asheville-area handyman to help you with your to-do lists? Give me a call! This is the second post in which I’m showing off a beautiful house near Mars Hill and Weaverville. I’ve been working with the owners, Henry and Barbara, to fix the house up. The kitchen in this house has great “bones.” That is, the cabinets are solid and sturdy, and it’s got a nice big peninsula that lets onlookers sit and eat breakfast or talk to the cook. But like any kitchen that’s been lived in for a little while, it needed a few small updates to give it a fresh appearance. We recently did the basic update, starting with the simple stuff: a good-quality faucet and new strainers in the sink. The cabinets were starting to fade a little, so we touched them up and put a new coat of finish them. They look brand new, don't they? And finally the appliances arrived. This really is a nice kitchen, and a nice house overall. It will be up for sale soon, so let me know if you’re interested in buying it.
This house is going up for sale in a week or so (if it’s not already listed). It has a fantastic eastern facing view looking over beautifully tilled fields. It’s on a quiet road, and the whole neighborhood seems to be a really peaceful place. (Click any of these four pictures to enlarge.) I worked on it for 3 weeks, helping Henry and Barbara get it ready to sell. They had already painted all the rooms and doors, steam-cleaned the carpets, pulled off the flower print wallpaper, and probably cleaned up a hundred other details. But they wanted to get it on the market by early Spring, and they still had a lot to do, so Henry called me. We walked through the house and wrote out a long list of everything they wanted done. He asked me to start by renovating both bathrooms. I removed all the baseboards and fixtures. Then I tiled the floor. Here's some "before" and "during" pictures: While the tile grout was drying, I worked on smaller details like installing closet shelves and rods, replacing broken mirrors and torn window screens, updating faucets, adjusting doors to make them open and close properly, and replacing the locks, latches and handles on the doors. After the tile grout dried, Henry painted the bathrooms. Then we installed new vanity cabinets, counter tops and faucets. Fortunately the tubs were both in great shape and we were able to leave those. The renovations both turned out really well. I think they got a good bang for their buck by bringing these bathrooms up to date. Bathrooms are said to be the second-most used room in a house, with the kitchen being first. We did update the kitchen on this house, but that's for another post. Getting ready to sell your house? Why not get an estimate to update it?
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