Reviewed: Seven Steps to Sold [Book]

Tip #99: “Clean like you’ve never cleaned before” (page 11). I’m going to hate selling. Tip #1? ”Start packing! Begin the move-out process as soon as you decide to sell” (page 5). I’m going to love selling. I didn’t expect to enjoy a book by two realtors… but it’s lovely. For such a skinny little book, I cant believe how much info it holds. After a moment’s trite mother/daughter banter, Seven Steps to Sold gets going. And I learned a lot.

99 simple ways to ensure a successful sale, including:

• Consider which parts of the home are hit by sunlight during the time an open house runs… and make sure they’re particularly spotless (page 9).
• “Remember what you loved about the house when you first saw it” (page 5). Oh, I remember. But since we killed it – I’ll think of some new things: the balcony and laundry.
• Buyers will look in your closets, but probably not in your fridge (page 174).
• Mounts the case against selling-by-owner – not an entirely surprising viewpoint for two realtors, but persuasive nonetheless (page 53).
• A four-month schedule to enact a low-stress sale, with ample time for packing, staging, etc. Not knowing this, I’d have thought it could all happen in a month.
• I had NO idea you could use Bar Keepers Friend on a stainless steel fridge (page 172). This has just changed my life and I don’t care how 1950s that makes me.
• A year in the buyers’ cycle… which demographics look for what, and when (page 98).
• Increase “subliminal square footage” by making “visual connections between the indoors and outdoors” (page 179). Plants, people. We will do this with plants.

New term: ”Short sell” – I would have guessed it’s a good thing, that it happened quickly. Wrong. Defined, ‘short sell’ means ”selling a home for less than what’s owed” (page 18).

“Coordinating the sale of your current house with the purchase of a new one can be tricky…. We visualize seller in this situation as if they’re suspended from a trapeze, desperately holding on to one bar with their hands and the other with their feet” (page 33).

Great. I can’t even do a front somersault.

What’s the #1 goal in selling your house? Apparently the answer should be more specific than ”finding someone to give me money for this sucker” (page 28).

“[T]he process of buying a house is like standing naked in front of a mirror” (page 82).

Thankfully, there’s nothing in the book about making money. Your motivation is left vague and your own business, they just help with the process. In fact they go into the psychology of why upsizing is more stressful than downsizing – who knew?

12 little things that can make a big impression (page 106):

• Yesssss, solar-tubes come recommended. Solar-tubes are in my near future. (When their installation doesn’t mean running a tube through the homes of people who live between me and the roof).
• Points to Liz on her previous flip – a wine fridge comes recommended in 3rd place.
• Fruit trees are endorsed, making me think that the balcony green wall definitely stays.

“You can never do too much to stage your house…” (page 147) .

OCD heaven? I loved the rules for staging a kitchen (page 170) – and learned the one place that men always looking during a viewing.

 Covers Canada?  No, but doesn’t really matter. Mostly, the book is helpful common sense, though reference to laws in “some states” raises local questions. We’ll surely receive guidance from our agent. A continued emphasis on avoiding lawsuits does strike an American tone.

1 reason to read it? It’s a book for dummies, without the Dummies approach. My favourite part is a checklist to help you “get inside the buyer’s mind” – a little marketing & psychology refresher (81).

Conclusion: Love this book because it gives you ACTUAL things to do, not just fluff. The worst part is its use of the appalling term “brain-dumping” – the rest is gold, very useful stuff I’ll put to use at once (like scanning our books to see if any are … controversial?). It’s the perfect book for reading when selling is a vague idea some months away and I want to be prepared for it, not stressed or scared. Highly recommend this book – unusual for me.