Making your viewers feel welcome to your home is a team effort between you and your agent but the results are crucial to a successful sale or let. First impressions start with the photos your agent takes but there’s also the inevitable drive by inspections before viewings and then the viewings themselves.
Whether you’re looking for buyers or tenants, making them feel welcome and comfortable is a very good start. Owners ask us for advice on this topic all the time so we’ve had an office brainstorm and come up with this quick checklist. Some of these points can be the owners responsibility but others can be sorted out or double checked by the agent before each viewing;
Entrance
Clear post/junk mail from the mat
Clean down the front door & polish up the door furniture
Draught proof doors (also helps with noise inside if you’re in a busy spot)
Flats – don’t spruce up your flat and forget the communal halls (bikes, unclaimed post and pushchairs)
Well lit entrance space with no clutter – coats, brollies and boots are unavoidable but need to be ordered and tidy
Outside
Clean windows and put blinds up/tie curtains back
Colourful plants and neat gardens (no weeds and the lawn mowed!)
Scrub paths and patios – Jeyes fluid works a treat
Shuffle the recycling bins/sacks into a corner or buy a garden store to house them in
If you’re lucky enough to have a drive at the front, make sure its as tidy as the front garden – eliminate oil marks, uneven gravel or potholes
General inside
Temperature – we’re getting close to winter season so a bit of background warmth on viewings never goes amiss
Lighting – keep some side lights on or make sure the agent gets there first and switches on some strategic lighting
Laundry – a fact of life but tidy in a corner on a clothes horse, not all over radiators and hanging off doors
Grout, seals and sills – wipe down condensation prone surfaces and reseal round baths/showers where needed
Cobwebs and dust – look up, around the light fittings and into the corners
Kitchen and bathroom surfaces clean & tidy – bright product bottles put into cupboards
Childrens toys tidied out of the traffic zones – no one likes stepping on Lego or squeezing past baby bouncers
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