Home Selling: When to Fit in & When to Stand Out

As you stage your home for selling, you start to think about how you can compete with others in your neighborhood and city. With these tips, you will know when you want to stick to the basics, and when you can really show off your home's unique style.

Flooring: Fit In

In a lot of cases, you want to stage your home to suit or at least complement the current trends for that aspect of the home. For your flooring, you may want to be a little more conservative. Hardwood flooring trends for 2017 already feature some bold designs, with:

• wide planks
• contrasting colors with dark and light stains
• patterns such as parquet, geometric or herringbone

The problem is that some stylish trends are quite subjective and visually arresting. This means that your buyers may be spending far too much time staring at the floor patterns in your Abacoa home for sale when they should be looking at all the lovely space in your living room. Plus, hardwood flooring is expensive to add right before you sell. You know you need to replace old carpet. Beyond that, aim for flooring options in pleasing neutrals.

Landscaping: Stand Out

You would not want buyers to be shocked by a random splash of red paint on your walls. However, plants that offer a dazzling burst of color at various points in your yard are a delightful distraction. You want your landscaping to feel alive, and you can do that with a lot of greenery and color. Even a raised bed full of wildflowers of different species would not go amiss, if they are well-contained and do not resemble weeds.

There is a possibility that the buyers will immediately decide to pull out all of it, but you will not have invested quite as much to put it in. Do not forget about outdoor seating, as well. You can feel free to select seats with cushions in bright colors like yellow, orange or blue, to suit the season.

Kitchen: Fit In

Possibly the only thing holding you back from seriously renovating your kitchen is the price tag. And with the average price of a minor kitchen remodel costing upward of $20,000, it is not surprising. However, you now have another reason: buyer impression. Buyers who have learned to view homes with a critical eye will only see features of a home they can live with, and problems they have to fix.

Dressing up the kitchen with a specific theme limits the number of buyers who will flock to it. Instead, choose a fairly minor things for your kitchen upgrades, and make sure that buyers see its elegance and convenience by making sure everything is clean and staged correctly.

Storage: Stand Out

The one part of your home that you will never have enough of is storage. Buyers feel exactly the same way. Every inch of your home that is maximized for storage will yield benefits for you.

As you create a plan to improve the storage, keep one thing in mind: all Jupiter homes have closets. You want your home to show off the best storage, custom-built (or seemingly custom-built) for the home. Look in every closet and see how you can add simple, adjustable shelving or cabinetry. Install drawers in the pantry for easy access. Make sure that your garage walls have something on them, even if it is just a series of hooks and racks.

Paint Colors: Fit In

The trick to staging your interior walls is to be current without being too trendy. For the past couple of years, the color trend for walls is a warm gray that some people call "greige." People who are already tired of seeing this hue may think your home is both dated and cliché.

Do not backlash against the greige by selecting loud colors, however. Shades that are too bright or dark make the space seem smaller, and they can distract from the overall feel of the room. Instead, select natural neutrals that have a timeless feel, and rely on room accents to add that necessary pop of color.

Bathroom: Stand Out

You probably would not dream of redesigning your kitchen in a mid-century modern design, because it would appeal to a very small niche of buyers. Your bathroom is the place to let some of your inner creativity shine through. Your bathroom should be functional and clean, but you can also really build up the design to showcase its best qualities. Contrast dark slate flooring with a white marble pedestal sink, or do the entire room in white or faded neutrals. The effect will make the space feel like an upscale salon or spa.

Selling a home is a complicated dance you perform for future buyers. If you stand out and fit in at the right times, you will entice buyers inside without scaring them away.