Selling Your Home? Declutter Like a Pro with These 6 Home Organization Tips

Keep Entrance Halls Clear

First impressions count when selling your home, and your entrance hall is the first interior space prospective buyers will see. The last thing you want to do is to leave buyers feeling claustrophobic or cramped when they first set foot through the door. Therefore, clearing up this area is crucial if you want interested visitors to feel comfortable.

For best results, you’ll need to create an open, “airy” feel which will draw people in. To do this, declutter your hallway by removing all your photographs, artwork, shoes and unnecessary furniture to make the most of the available space. A new doormat and an accent table with a reed diffuser or vase is a pleasant touch, but anything more than this should be packed away to maximize the sense of a spacious atmosphere.

Showcase The Kitchen

The kitchen is perhaps the most important space in your home when it comes to selling your property. As a heavily used room, buyers will be scrutinizing whether the available space is going to be sufficient for them and their families. For this reason, you must do all you can to make your kitchen appear as spacious as possible. Countertops should be cleaned thoroughly and cleared of everything but basic appliances. This means that your breadbox, blender, coffee jars and decorative items should all be the first to go.

Buyers love to open all your cabinets and drawers while assessing storage space, so your job here is to make your kitchen appear “lived in” but with plenty of room to spare. Go through all your cabinets and remove as much as you can, organizing what remains in an attractive fashion. If you have lots of dishes and crockery, consider packing them all away apart from those you use on a regular basis.

You mustn’t forget to clean out your refrigerator either. You don’t want to leave it empty, but an overflowing and dirty fridge screams lack of space and poor maintenance habits. Remove and throw away any expired foods or withered produce, use up any leftovers and stick to the bare essentials while selling your home. Ideally, you should stock no more than 50% of the available space with a few neatly-arranged food items.  Make sure you have deep-cleaned your fridge’s interior as well. A gleaming, tidy fridge will leave a great impression upon your interested visitors.

If you have trinkets or decorative items adorning the top of your cabinets and window sills, be brutal and pack them away. They may be special to you and fit your taste, but prospective buyers will see them as off-putting clutter. This isn’t to say you must remove all non-functional items from your kitchen, but anything you do leave on display must be minimal and not distracting to the eye. Great unobtrusive touches include: an attractive flowering plant, a fresh fruit bowl or a cookbook on a stand.

Once the counter has been cleared and re-arranged, you can move to onto other areas of the bathroom. If you can manage it, removing the shower curtain will make the space feel bigger than it is. The same goes for window blinds, wall art, body weight scales and oversized mats.

Open all your closets and drawers and be brutal with the contents. Any threadbare towels and ratty old robes should be removed. In line with the kitchen, try to clear all but 50% of the space in these areas to maximize the impression that there’s plenty of room available.