You might post over on the "Buying and Selling Homes" Gardenweb Forum too.

For us - we had three small children so I made sure than any messes were kept as small as possible during the day. After everyone was tucked in, I did a "check" of each room and wiped down sinks, vacuumed, straightened pillows, etc. In the morning - I did another sweep through the house - making beds, making sure clothes were put away, and everything was in order. The key for us - again, especially with little ones around - was to eliminate clutter before we put it on the market. To do this we boxed up about 1/3 of our stuff and stored it at a storage facility. It made the house look very orderly (more model home-ish) and there was much less to pick-up, dust around, etc.

Thanks, I didn't even see the Buying and Selling thread! I'll repost there.

When we had our house on the market, our real estate agent told us to keep all the lights on in the house. Not very PC, but it made the house show better. We also baked cookies right before our open house. I think someone else suggested putting a drop or two of vanilla on the light bulbs. That's all I can remember right now. Good luck!

All three times I backed my way out of the house w/ windex, paper towels, a swiffer, and a broom in hand, LOL! My car looked like I was running a cleaning service, I kid you not. I also did a ton of packing in the weeks prior to my places officially going on the market. Closets were way paired down, less toys, etc., (it is like packing for a vacation but in reverse) when you've only got the essentials around its much easier to keep things constantly neat.

It is going to be a lot of work but the most important thing when selling (well...besides price) is cleanliness. Getting as much as you can get done the night before is great. You'll be living like guests in your own home, but you're looking to sell that house and buy a new home so you practically are :). If you can get it down to just throwing clothes in hampers, stashing breakfast dishes in DW, making beds, and quick wipe downs of sinks & showers, you'll be in good shape. Animals throw a wrench in this whole system though...it is like they know what you're up to and they're not going to make it easy on you.

Wishing you lots of luck!

We sold our house pretty quickly last year. After packing up and moving or giving away a good deal of our stuff, moving the dogs out (I moved with them, and traveled back and forth until the house sold), and hiring a service to do a big initial cleaning including the windows, it was easy to keep things looking good every day. We straightened and put away EVERYTHING every day.

We relied on keeping the house smelling clean rather than baking etc. because my husband was there more than I was and he does not cook. Kept the refrigerator clean and ran the disposal so there were no mysterious odors. We wiped down the bathrooms every day with the disposable disinfectant wipes, which we don't normally use but are perfect for this purpose. My husband also doesn't clean, so it was funny trying to explain to him the necessity of doing this wiping job when I wasn't there.

Our Realtor came in and turned on the lights before prospective buyers arrived so we didn't have to leave them on all the time.

Also we kept the curtains open more than we normally would have. Our buyers told us that they drove past our house one evening and could see all the way back into the kitchen where we were making dinner, and the lights and colors gave them a good feeling that the house was meant for them. :)

I sold my house last year. Most of the times realtors would give you about 24 hrs notice before coming by, but sometimes it was like 10 minutes. I bought a wicker laundry hamper and if in a pinch I needed to straighten up I would dump everything in it. I also bought a 3 compartment laundry sorter- nobody wants to see piles of laundry near the washer/dryer.

Our house is on the market right now, and we have 2 children under 3 years of age. It is like we're, as someone put it, "living as guests in our own home".

A few of the showings have been those, "can we come see the house in like, 15 minutes?", type-showings. For those, I have hid any clean laundry in the dryer and all the dirty laundry in the washer.

I have a big rubbermaid storage container that I will run through the house with and stash anything we have gotten out that would take up too much time to put away at that moment. Then after the showing, I will put it all away. I can't expect the kids not to play with their toys, so I let them string their things about, knowing that if need be, I'll just make a quick sweep through the house with my tub.

Other than that, it's vaccuum and swiffer every night before bed. We have an empty dishwasher every night before bed. Laundry folded and put away before bed. We also got rid of all bath mats, since they would never seem clean enough to show. Our agent said that kitchens and bathrooms especially need to "sparkle". That's where we focus most of our attention. Then a couple of times a week I go through the house with windex and pledge and shine up the windows and furniture.

I was just going to recomend the basket idea as well! I kept a laundry basket ready for a 5 second sweep through the house - dump anything out into the basket and toss it in the car with you as you go.

Our house is on the market now, and every night I pick up after our 3 kids, make sure the kitchen is spotless, bathrooms wiped and floors cleaned. In the morning I load in breakfast dishes and start the dishwasher, make beds and make sure the entry is swept. I have wood floors everywhere so dog hair tumble weeds can be obvious!

As far as lighting goes, I keep a lamp on in each bedroom, all the kitchen and bathroom lights on, entry and stairway lights and several lamps in the living/dining. The family room has 2 french doors so it's always light. Just go through your house on an overcast day and see which rooms are darkest - keep those lights on.

Don't over scent your house - it makes people wonder what you are trying to cover up. A clean smell with a little underlying vanilla or other warm smell is great. One plug in on each level of the house can do the trick.

Make sure your porch area and foyer are welcoming and your front door opens and closes easily. First and last impressions are huge!

Good luck!

Oh, and another thing I did was I went out and bought oil plug-ins for every single room in the house. I heard somewhere that vanilla is a scent that appeals to most people and so I used vanilla throughout the whole house. When I know someone is coming, I'll usually go through and spray a little vanilla febreeze too.

And as far as lights go, we put flourescents in our lamps and we leave at least one lamp on in every room. We took the window treatments completely off of our big window on the front of the house and whenever I leave, I pull up all the shades in the other rooms. It really helps to let as much light in your house as possible.

A quick caution about plug-ins we've learned over time/personal experiences...DBF is a Realtor, and he has had clients with respiratory issues, sometimes just allergies or a general aversion, who won't even view a home if those or room sprays are being used. As soon as you open the front door you can smell them and they just don't even want to, or can't, head in. Just a heads up to avoid or use sparingly (maybe the lowest setting?) while selling :).

"Oh, and another thing I did was I went out and bought oil plug-ins for every single room in the house. I heard somewhere that vanilla is a scent that appeals to most people and so I used vanilla throughout the whole house. When I know someone is coming, I'll usually go through and spray a little vanilla febreeze too."

People who overuse scent when selling a house are very often covering something up (according to two realtor friends...).
Even if YOU were not, many would think that and not bother looking....

We sold our house last year and I found it very helpful to have a checklist. I am home during the day and almost every showing had a two-hour warning so my situation was a little different than yours. But still, perhaps a list will help you feel in control of the situation.

I basically wrote down everything I wanted to remember to do, organized by room. For instance, under Living Room I listed vacuum, straighten slipcovers, adjust curtains, turn lights on, etc. I was kind of OCD about the whole process so I included little things like "put away dog bowls" and "cover burn spot on counter with soap dish".

The list really helped me feel calm when I finally left the house, knowing the house looked it's best and I didn't forget anything.

Good luck to you! Nicole

I'm sure with all the cleaning etc, you've thought of this, but please do remove all the magnet clutter from the front of the frig door! Nothing clutters a kitchen worse than that to many people, and it makes it look so much cleaner without it!

I'm tired of hearing about people with allergies and their problems to scents. I feel sorry for them, but every time I go into Bath and Body Works, it's packed out. Surely there are still plenty of people who do like scents and I think they far out number the ones who have issues.
Again, I feel bad for them but lets not encumber the rest of the world with their problems. And if they come to my house, I won't burn candles and I'll remove my wallflowers. Odor de doggie will be the only aroma.

I think Nicole's idea of a check list is great. That way, you don't have to sit at the park with the kids or at your desk wondering if you remembered to open the blinds in the guest room or some other nonsense.

I also plan to have an evacuation bag ready, mostly for the dog. I will have a big tote bag by the back door to load his stuff into (toys, dishes, bed, etc.) so we can remove all traces of his presence, if that's possible.

I will also keep stuff in the car like magazines or a book, bottles of water and a folding chair, so I can try to relax at the dog park while a showing is going on.

If you have kids, maybe a bag with toys, snacks, etc. should be in the car, always at the ready so you don't have a last-minute PBJ dash for a lunchtime showing.

As for an actual system for keeping up with the house, Flylady has a great plan, including checklists. I find the e-mails overwhelming, but I love the daily/weekly/monthly lists. Do I always use them? Uh, no... (Did you have to ask...?!)

LOL bumblebeez!

I'm a total candle freak, and have plenty of scent in my own home (mingled with eau de poodle) when I'm *not* trying to sell it.

I'm a flylady drop out...so depressing...

At the time we were selling our previous house, I was still working. So, we took our greyhound to doggy day care everyday so that she (and all her stuff) wouldn't be at the house during showings while we were at work. Expensive at $20 per day, but necessary in our market. Also, we didn't want anyone messing with our dog! Of course, she was thrilled to be playing and pampered all day!

I lucked out when I sold mine. I moved out first as I knew I could never show the house with so many birds and dogs in it. Then I returned every day to work on it, stripping wallpaper, painting and so on. I hired a fellow to put in the basement. His wife came over to see what he was doing and fell in love with the house. They bought it and I never needed to use a real estate agent or show the house. I just went to a r.e. atty for about 1/2 hour and signed a couple of pieces of paper is all.

Our realtor did not have a key, that way we maintained control over when showings were held. That being said, we cleaned WHEN we had a scheduled showing and not daily. I'm sorry, I work full time, had 3 kids and simply can't live like it's a model home, LOL...

Thanks, everyone! These are all really helpful suggestions. I like the checklist suggestion, as I'm already in a hurry when I leave for work in the morning, so I'm sure I would forget something. What did you all do if you had an alarm system? Just not turn it on during the day?

Wow! Bumblebeez....

"I'm tired of hearing about people with allergies and their problems to scents. I feel sorry for them, but every time I go into Bath and Body Works, it's packed out. Surely there are still plenty of people who do like scents and I think they far out number the ones who have issues.
Again, I feel bad for them but lets not encumber the rest of the world with their problems. And if they come to my house, I won't burn candles and I'll remove my wallflowers. Odor de doggie will be the only aroma."

I don't know you, but are you also the type of person to smoke inside and get sick of people complaining about the smoke? Lot's of people smoke, so those who don't like it should not encumber the rest of the world with their problems (sic).

You came across harsh...

I was originally (before I read your post) going to post something along the lines of: Please don't spray scents and such into the air before a showing. As someone who went through the buying process I looked at a lot of houses, some had no scents, others had too many scent, and everything in between. My perception of house with too many scents is that they are dirty. Houses that smelled like cleaning products, I perceived as clean. As for houses with no scents... I looked at the house.

I am one of those "complainers" who can't stand artificial scents. I can't go anywhere near the first floor of Macy's or walk past a Bath and Body works. Notice I said artificial scents. I LOVE natural scents and they don't make me feel sick. Most people who have an aversion to scents are to the chemicals, not the actual smell. If you place essential oils around, you get the smell with none of the chemicals. For those that like plug ins, you might try the reed diffusers with natural products. They do scent the air, but don't output chemicals.

I don't sound anymore harsh than you do about not spraying scents.
Like I said, I feel bad for you -really. It must be difficult having to avoid certain places. However, I don't think everyone else should change because of problems you and others have. I don't think schools should ban all peanut products either-although again, I really feel for the kids who have problems.
And no, I don't smoke and don't care to be around smokers either.
But if enough people like you stand up to the issues of chemical aromas perhaps things will change, the way smoking is now largely regulated to outdoors now.

I have no interest in regulating the use of scents (but over-regulation is a topic for another forum...). I just hope that one day people would realize that the choices that they make do affect other people.

Interesting that you bring up the peanut allergy... A mother who thought similar to you sent peanut m&m's with her child against the rules (she didn't agree with the rules) - that afternoon I had to use an Epi-Pen on a 7 year old girl. That mom didn't realize that her choices affected other people. It almost cost the live of a child - luckily, the facility I was working at was properly stocked and I was properly trained.

But this has gotten way off topic. ;)

My point is... if you want to sell your house, you should make it comfortable to the people who walk in the door. Open windows, turn on lights, pick up the toys, and don't spray chemicals....

just my opinion...

That mother was very wrong to send those m &m's knowing that they were forbidden.

When our house was for sale (and we were also looking) heavy perfumed clued me that something must stink in the home they were covering up. so don' perfume thinking you make the house smell better. You make people SUSPICIOUS!!

And baking cookies is pretty time consuming and not realistic. Seriously, don't waste time doing this. No one is going to overlook something because the scent of cookies lingers in the air. The time it takes to get the house looking like no one lives there takes enough time!!