SELLER CHECKLIST

How to sell your home for more

Most of what puts more money in your pocket happens before your home hits the market, and most of it costs little or nothing. This is the full list I go through when I come by for a home evaluation. Cheapest first.

Where the 5% comes from

I tell sellers these steps can add up to 5% to what buyers offer. Here’s the evidence behind that number, so you can judge it yourself.

In the National Association of REALTORS® 2025 Profile of Home Staging, 19% of sellers’ agents said staging raised the dollar value buyers offered by 1% to 5%, compared with similar homes. Another 10% saw 6% to 10%. And 30% saw no change at all. That’s an American survey, and staging is only one item on this list.

So it’s not a promise. Some homes gain a lot from this list. Some are already in great shape and gain little. At your place I’ll tell you which one yours is.

Declutter and clean

Cost: a few weekends. This is the item agents recommend most. In the same NAR survey, 91% of sellers’ agents told their sellers to declutter and 88% to clean the whole home.

• Pack away about half of what’s on counters, shelves and walls. You’re moving anyway.
• Clear the floors. Buyers judge a room by how much floor they can see.
• Empty the garage enough to park in it. Buyers open that door.
• Take out family photos and anything personal, so buyers can picture their own things there.
• Clean like a move-out inspection: windows, baseboards, grout, light fixtures, inside the oven.
• Deal with pet and smoke smell. Buyers notice it at the front door and remember it.

Stage the rooms buyers care about

Buyers’ agents in the NAR survey ranked the living room, the primary bedroom and the kitchen as the rooms that matter most to stage. Start there.

• Arrange the furniture so the room’s best feature is the first thing you see.
• Take out pieces that make a room feel small. Rooms with less in them read bigger.
• One clear purpose per room. A spare room that’s half office and half storage reads as neither.
• Fresh towels, a made bed, lights on for every showing.
• For a vacant home, real or virtual staging helps buyers judge the size of a room. Virtual staging is always labelled.

Fix what a buyer would put on their to-do list

My rule: if the average buyer would walk through and write it down as a job to do, and it costs hundreds or a few thousand dollars, do it before you list. If it costs tens of thousands or takes months, we price for it instead.

• Paint, in a light neutral, where the walls are marked, dark or bold.
• Swap dated light switches, outlets and covers. A few hundred dollars that makes a house feel newer.
• Replace dated light fixtures and tap hardware where they date the room.
• Burnt-out bulbs, dripping taps, running toilets, sticking doors, loose handles.
• Fresh caulking in kitchens and bathrooms.
• Patch holes and dents in walls and trim.

Don’t over-renovate

Big projects done right before a sale rarely pay back their full cost. A new deck won’t fix a dated kitchen. A new kitchen in a home with an old roof is the wrong order. Before you spend real money, ask me first and I’ll tell you what buyers in your price range are actually paying for.

Get the outside right

The front of the house is the first photo and the first thing a buyer sees from the car. In the NAR survey, 77% of sellers’ agents recommended improving curb appeal.

• Cut, edge and trim. Fresh mulch or bark in the beds.
• Power-wash the driveway, walkways and deck.
• Paint or replace a tired front door, and update the house numbers and the light beside it.
• Clean the gutters and the windows.
• Clear the side yards and put away the hoses, bins and toys.

Service the mechanical and keep the receipts

I spent six years as a journeyman HVAC technician before real estate. Buyers and their inspectors look hard at the furnace, the air conditioner and the hot water tank, because those are expensive to replace.

• Have the furnace and air conditioner serviced, and change the filter.
• Flush or check the hot water tank, and know its age.
• Put the service receipts, warranties and any permits in one folder for buyers to see.
• Know your utility costs for the last 12 months. Buyers ask.

If your home has Poly-B plumbing or geothermal heating, read those first. Both come up with buyers, and both are easier to handle up front.

Consider a pre-listing inspection

In BC most buyers still make their offer subject to their own inspection, so this doesn’t replace theirs. What it does is find the problems before a buyer does. You fix them first, or you disclose them and buyers price them into the offer, instead of asking for money off after we’ve agreed on a price.

Derek Fuhr at Candor Inspections is who I use. For anything the inspection turns up, I’ll send you to trades I use myself.

Photos, video and floor plans

Photography, video, drone and floor plans on my listings are handled by me. They’re not added to your costs at completion.

• We shoot after everything above is done, never before.
• The first three photos do most of the work: the main living space, the kitchen, and the best bedroom or outdoor space.
• No extreme wide-angle shots. If a room looks bigger online than in person, buyers walk in disappointed.
• Twilight photos for a view home. A floor plan for every home.

Launch it right

A listing gets the most attention it will ever get in its first few weeks. That’s when the buyers who’ve been waiting for exactly your kind of home see it.

• We price where those buyers are ready to act, with the comparable sales in front of you.
• We launch with the photos done, the house ready to show, and a showing plan for the first weekend.
• If the response isn’t what it should be, I call you early with what I’m seeing and what I’d do.

How I handle each of these is on my selling page.

What you keep

On your principal residence, the Canada Revenue Agency says you usually pay no tax on the gain when you sell, if it was your principal residence for every year you owned it. You still have to report the sale on your tax return. So money a buyer adds to the price is generally money you keep. Confirm it with your accountant for your own situation.

What happens at the home evaluation

1. I walk the outside first, then every room with you. You tell me what you love about the home and what you think a buyer might question.
2. I pull the recent sales that actually compare to yours and give you a price range.
3. I estimate what you’d walk away with after the mortgage and selling costs.
4. You get this list marked up for your home: what to do, what to skip, and roughly what each item costs.
5. We set a date for the next step.

If you’re a few months out, I’ll give you a range now and do the full analysis closer to listing. The number moves as homes around you sell, so a detailed one today would be out of date by then. If you’re buying your next place at the same time, here’s how to sequence buying and selling.

Source for the staging figures: National Association of REALTORS®, 2025 Profile of Home Staging (May 2025), a survey of US REALTORS®. Tax: Canada Revenue Agency, principal residence guidance. Not intended to solicit properties currently listed for sale.