6 Surprising Things Home Buyers Notice First in a Home

6 Surprising Things Home Buyers Notice First in a Home

When you’re having guests over for a social get together or party, don’t you make sure that your home’s as clean and welcoming as it can be?

Putting your house on the market means that you practically need to have that level of preparedness for the period of the marketing.

After all, you only have one chance at making that first impression!

Especially with that potential home buyer!

Regardless what you as the homeowner believe to be ‘perfect‘, a lot of people will have different tastes than you.

In other words, there will always be things which will stand out, both in a positive and negative way, to your visitors.

What could possibly be the surprising things home buyers notice first when entering a home?

Here is a list of the main 6 things any home seller might want to pay attention to:

No.1: Level of cleanliness

Let’s say that there’s good news and bad news when it comes to home cleanliness.

On the one hand, visiting home buyers will obviously have noticed that the house is (relatively) messy.

And you bet your bottom dollar that they’ll judge you for it!

The first impression has been made!

Do you like to be welcomed by a clean, tidy home?

Of course, you do!

Doesn’t that put things in perspective how important preparing one’s home for sale actually is?

However, the upside here is that even though interested home buyers are trying to overlook the mess, funnily enough, it makes the buyers feel better about their own cleanliness at home!

No.2: Furniture placement

Big room with barely any furniture?

Small room stuffed with furniture?

Either way, home buyers will mentally rearrange the furniture in your home, and given the layout, they’ll picture their own furniture.

That’s exactly why empty homes don’t sell easily!

No.3: Bright-colored walls

This shouldn’t be too much of a surprise to anyone!

Lumo-yellow living rooms, bright-blue bathroom walls or teenagers with dark purple colored bedrooms will scream for an immediate approval/disproval by the visiting home buyers.

Any bright color in any room will invoke a reaction unless you’ve got neutral or white colors throughout.

All those years, you may have loved the look of those walls, but going into the marketing phase of your property, you may want to reconsider giving them a quick neutral color!

Hopefully, it won’t be something you’re going to be looking at for too much longer!

No.4: Different light sources

What was your impression of visiting your friend’s home which turned out to have decent lighting?

You probably don’t necessarily remember it, however, if her home would have had a dark entrance hall or kitchen, you would have remembered!

Similarly, when home buyers enter into a home and the lighting level isn’t bright enough, exactly that negative impression will be created.

Whereas people don’t really pay a lot of attention to the fixtures or chandeliers (unless it’s a feature in the entrance area or dining room), the light into a room, whether natural or created by your spotlights, will make a huge difference.

Why do you think real estate agents like to turn on every single light in every single room, regardless whether it’s sunny outside or not?

No.5: Pleasant scents

Having lived in your home for many years (or decades), you won’t necessarily notice the different scents across the house.

Hopefully, it’ll be nice food-related aromas coming out of the kitchen or flower-scented smells as you walk around the back patio!

Too often than not, however, the homeowner might have a certain preference for the spicier Asian cuisine, which will undoubtedly leave lingering scents hanging around the house.

And those aren’t always be welcomed by the visiting home buyers!

Having pets roaming around the house and backyard might affect the scents as well – especially if the backyard hasn’t been properly cleaned up after the “dogs’ visits” shortly before the home viewing!

It wouldn’t be the first time that the agent, together with the interested home buyers, need to zig-zag in between the ‘souvenirs’ while trying to ignore the smells!

Plenty of home stores nowadays which offer scented candles and diffusers to tackle those potential issues!

Get yourself a set of 5 and spread them throughout the house, from the kitchen, living areas, bedrooms to the bathrooms!

A huge potential problem diverted for relatively no money!

No.6: Any art or books

Being welcomed into a home by family pictures or interesting art is definitely something home buyers notice.

They may not necessarily stop and analyze the artwork itself, but subconsciously they feel they’ve entered into a warm home.

However, having said that, if the art is rather generic, it will leave a somewhat negative impression!

Also, haven’t you noticed that a happy home tends to be one where people read books?

So don’t start packing those books, but leave your bookshelves filled with all of your great reading materials!

It might be exactly that what convinces that undecided home buyer!

Closing thoughts

Were you surprised to read the above list of things home buyers notice first in your home?

Say, you were to be marketing your property right now, if you now take a look around your home with the information above, how much would you change?

Home buyers love to see interesting art, book titles, and plants in your home. Yet, brightly-colored walls, horrible lighting, and bad taste artwork will be enough to put them off!

And, most surprisingly, leaving a mess might not be an inviting sight and will obviously be noticed, but most home buyers will look over it as it makes them feel better about their own cleanliness at home!

Now, does it make you stop and realize how easily that first impression can be good one or bad one, depending on your current interior design?