Do You Live In Your House?

I recently attended back to back closings for a pair of clients who were scaling down and moving for the second time in a few years. They were bemoaning the fact that they still had some cleaning to do before they were willing to hand over the keys to the new buyer. Now I’ve been in this house and they are very clean and tidy people, but it got me thinking about moving and why I don’t like it. I think it’s because I don’t like the discovery of what’s left under the refrigerator or the bed or the dryer. When is the last time you looked under there? There is some nasty stuff if you haven’t pulled those out and cleaned there lately! One solution might be to just stay put and don’t ever move, but that is not practical for most of us. I recently remodeled a bathroom and turned a bedroom into an entryway-mud room and was disgusted when I cleaned out the vanity to remove it and cleaned the closet from the bedroom prior to ripping it out. My wife is a white tornado when it comes to vacuuming, but nonetheless the icky places still existed. I guess it’s that way in any home.

If you really live in your house then you know what I am talking about and you know that it takes a concerted effort to keep up with the ongoing cleaning and maintenance issues with a home. Those issues should not be postponed until you sell it, because that bill for repairs may be a huge hurdle if you have to handle all of it at once just to sell your home. A better strategy would be to pick a few items each week of the summer and just DO IT.

We only have a few weeks of summer left, so now might be a good time to make the list of items you want to accomplish before the snow comes. Think about cleaning your gutters and tightening those few roof screws or fixing that dripping frost free faucet. Repaint that spot that is peeling on the soffit before the weather makes it worse. Replace that window that lost its seal a few years ago,… since it’s been bugging you and it looks so bad. The new buyer will think it looks bad too! Save the job of cleaning under the refrigerator and dryer until it’s cold outside…. or just wait till you move!