Long term planning of selling your home?

[Sigarms]

Lots of good advice here.

We retired 7+ years ago at age 55. We spent a couple of years looking for a place off and on with the intentions of downsizing and getting into a single story home. We even considered building again. We gave up, we cannot replace what we have. Our criteria was pretty strict, we have 45 acres so privacy was at the top of the list, we also wanted water front, in upstate NY or Vermont. We decided to stay where we are. Yes, the house is too big and the outside chore list is endless. We've updated the HVAC, kitchen and baths and replaced the roof, so house maintenance is minimal, other than painting the cedar siding every 5 years. If the time ever comes that one of us cannot do stairs, we can lose a closet and install an elevator. I designed the house with this in mind 30 years ago.

For us the advantages of staying put outweighed the benefits to moving/down sizing. Our neighbors are great. We're less than an hour to the important stuff - family, groceries, lumber yard, doctors, airport, etc.

At this point, with a 3 story house and 37 acres, we've come to the conclusion that that place is definitely to large for just the two of us.

 

[plowhog]

I make my living working on peoples homes, and I get jobs every year from home owners wanting to get their places ready to sell.

In my opinion,

This is wise, experienced, valuable insight. I have been investing in property for 20+ years not to mention buying, selling, and building my own homes. Not only do I agree, but Eddie said it better than I can.

If you read and follow what he presented you will not go wrong.

 

[Sigarms]

I make my living working on peoples homes, and I get jobs every year from home owners wanting to get their places ready to sell.

In my opinion, the smart ones are the ones that have talked to a good realtor that was blunt and honest with them about their house. Homes are like fashion. Most buyers don't have a clue about quality, layout, or issues. They look at paint color, lighting, cabinets and whatever the latest trend is. The best house in the world, for the best price, is going to struggle to sell if it's painted the wrong colors. People cannot get past what they see in front of them.

When I say "good realtor" I'm referring to those that sell dozens of homes every year. The tops ones here will sell a house every week. The vast majority of realtors are lucky if they sell one a month, and some only sell a few a year. Never talk to a realtor because that person is family, a friend, or even worse, a friends relative. Find out who the top 5 or top ten sellers are in your area. They are doing something different then the others.

DO NOT HIRE ANYONE until you have talked to all of them!!!!!!

Most realtors get hired because they are nice. Nice is good, but you want smart, knowledgeable and a proven record of getting the job done.

The realtor will tell you what buyers want, and what they are not liking in a house in your area. This is very different all over the country. What sells here probably wont do as well there. Do what the realtor tells you to do, and nothing more.

My clients tend to want to spend money on things that they have always wanted to do, or what has bothered them for years. A lot of the time, it's not something that will affect the sell of the house, and they are just wasting money. You are not fixing the house for you. Whatever you do to the house is to make it more desirable to as many potential buyers as possible.

Things that I would suggest you do before selling is to declutter. The more stuff you get out of the house, the more open it will appear. Wall color has a big impact on buyers. Something neutral and uniform through out the house is the safest. White is probably the best choice for wall colors right now. Bathrooms and kitchen should have a very sanitary feel to them. Tile, grout, cabinets should all be as close to pristine as possible. I just removed 5 layers of wallpaper from a bathroom a month ago, then textured the walls and painted. It looks like a totally different bathroom. Flooring needs to be something current, clean and in good shape. Kitchen's are where you make your money, or lose it. The current trend is to paint the cabinets white. I hate it, but it's what buyers are wanting. Granite counters will sell a house faster then any other single improvement. Curb appeal, some flowers and a lawn in good shape are also important to getting top dollar.

If you can, try to walk through some new homes to see what the builders are doing. They hire people to figure out what buyers want.

Never do anything that is too trendy. Odds are that it will look great today, but be embarrassing in a couple years. Be VERY CAREFUL about letting your wife made decisions on design. They tend to be more influenced by trends, and what everyone else is doing. I can't even count how many times I've met with clients that tell me they want to remodel their kitchen or bathroom, and they want it to be the last remodel that they ever do because the last one went out of style and became dated. Just think of glass tile and how it was so popular just a few years ago. Then they tell me that they want fake marble tile, subway tile and grey paint. This is the most current trend, and the one that every wife seems to copy from every other wife.

Also keep in mind, that it's easy to spend tens of thousands of dollars on getting a house ready to sell, and not seeing any of that money in the final sales price. Your realtor will tell you if you will get more money for a remodel, or painting, or landscaping. And if you should, or should not spend that money.

Good advice as expected, and we are pretty much on the same page.

We spent money on a walk in tub / shower that was needed for my father in the basement. May of my not increase the value, but we bought the house because it offered a furnished basement for a family member to live.

House built in 1988.

Over the last couple of years, we did spend some big bucks on having the master bath and guest bath remodeled, but we wanted that to live here. Just spent a pretty penny for the deck to be replaced, but again, it needed it.

In the 5 year time frame in the future, will probably replace two HVAC systems which I can handle myself with some side help.

Have electrical out to the shed that needs to be replaced, but it can be / should handled with minimum cost I believe.

Thinking about the kitchen, but the cost is up in the air as we may pass on it due to the cost alone and think it better is someone spent money on the way THEY want it done, not us.

My wife is pretty good at the interior keeping it neutral and nothing no outlandish per paint or anything else.

The only thing left is the popcorn ceiling. We when we did both bathrooms we had removed the popcorn ceiling, but still wondering, as the whole house is popcorn ceiling.

I have to laugh. Early pic of my and I when we bought the place close to 20 years ago (my beard is all gray now). The kitchen wall paper was the "nicest" looking we had in the home to replace. The bedrooms and bathrooms were much worse back then and the wall paper was "high end" and a PITA to get off... Honestly, the wall paper could make you go cross eyed if you looked at it too long...

 

[Sigarms]

Downsizing and getting rid of stuff looks to be a common thread in all my families moves.

Finding out exactly where they want to be is turning out to be elusive.

Both of your comments are related to ourselves.

 

[Sigarms]

I can't see selling a paid off property only to have a mortgage at today's rate when I'm retired. When I'm retired the one thing I definitely don't want is a mortgage. How big is your current home and property?

End of the day, our plan would not to have a mortgage after our last move into a "retirement" home of some sort.

 

[Sigarms]

Main thing I'd say about a retirement home is to buy or build so it's wheel chair friendly in case that situation ever arises. We hope it doesn't, but stairs can be a problem later in life.

Having my father move in with us at a spry 86 but pretty much becoming dependent on us for most of his days at age 90, that is something we are defiantly considering if we build new.

Some things you just don't think about until you have to live it with older age.

 

[HawkinsHollow]

Good stuff here!! We are about to put an 800 sqft addition on our house so lots of this is relevant in that regard. 49 and don't have to worry about retirement anytime soon but some of these tips should still factor into our design plans. Need to go back to read Eddie's post again!

 

[WVH1977]

Can you sub-divide the 37 acres, say keep 5 or so acres and then take the money from the sale and build a one-story with wide halls and big bathrooms? Could probably pay cash from the 30 acre sale and 3 story house to build the smaller house.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

I retired over a year ago now. We've been looking, and even bought land in S VA, but still not sure we want to pick up and move. We build our house ourselves, doing most of the work. Hard to let that go. Our house is too big now, but it's nice having extra space. We have been trying to get rid of junk, that's a slow process without a deadline.
I looked at a house online recently built the same year we build. It was a dump. I couldn't understand how a house could get that bad in that timeframe.
Our house is not perfect though, and needs some work. Floors are starting to squeek, kitchen flooring is starting to peel apart at a seam. I've been tempted to replace with the snap together. When we added on rooms over the garage, I used the wood snap together, and it's nice, and was easy to do, and used the vinyl snap together in the mudroom.

I custom made my oak kitchen cabinets. I would hate to see them painted. I would slap someone silly if they tried. Even told my wife if we moved, I might redo the kitchen with store bought cabinets and take these with us.
My bout with GBS a few years ago, did point out the need for a lower level master bedroom. I had to crawl up stairs to shower, and had a bed put in the family room while I was in a wheelchair. I don't want to add on and make the house larger, so may turn the 2 car garage (24x30) into a master suite, and building a detached pole barn garage.

I don't see have acres as being a reason to downsize, you don't have to do anything with it, you can plant trees and let them go.

 

[Snobdds]

I’m selling my home right now. We are going to probably rent, wait for the upcoming financial collapse (which I hear from reliable sources is going to be epic) and then buy when the RE market bottoms out.
I somewhat missed the peak of the market last year, but am still going to do pretty well. We can pay our rented house monthly rent with interest on the money from selling our home almost in perpetuity.

I don't see a crash coming. The fed has too many financial engineering tools to prevent that from happening. There is over 5 trillion sitting in money market and CD's waiting to park it in a long term asset.

The only thing that will turn this market is a huge die off in baby boomers. Once all those houses hit the market in 10 years...then the supply trap will unwind.