Selling Houses: The Basics of Design Psychology

I'm often asked about the basics of Design Psychology, which offers innovative interior and exterior design ideas for increasing profit and shortening market time. In reply, I begin by saying that Design Psychology's strategies go well beyond normal cleaning, painting, and repair.

Here are a few Design Psychology tips you can use to maximize your sales profits without having to spend a great deal of money:

The first step is to emotionally detach yourself from your home. Think of your house as an investment that needs to be sold. Your ultimate objective is to spur buyers' imaginations by making your home feel like a nicely-appointed vacation property.

Set out your best china and finest linens, and pack away everything you won't need, including personal items such as family pictures. You want to create a feeling of luxury and comfort, because buyers will pay more for a home that makes them feel pampered.

Once the interior of your home feels warm and inviting, it's time to take a look at the rest of the property. Pretend you're a home buyer, seeing the property for the first time. It may help to have a friend along, in order to be more objective.

Walk around your property, making notes of "No Cost," "Small Cost," and "Dream List" changes. Then walk to the front door, enter the house, and walk through your home, letting the natural flow of the floor plan guide you all the way to the backyard. Look for things that need attention, noting everything that detracts from the warm, inviting feeling you're trying to create.

When you're done with your investigation, tackle the "No Cost" items first, which might include such things as simple as rearranging furniture to improve traffic flow or to make the rooms feel larger. Under-furnished rooms will also give buyers the opportunity to imagine their own furnishings in your home, so it's worthwhile to either sell or place unnecessary furniture in storage.

When you begin to consider the repairs that will cost money, make sure that every expense will be worth the eventual benefit. Ask your Realtor for help determining which upgrades yield the highest return in your market.

Professor Jeanette Fisher, author of Doghouse to Dollhouse for Dollars, Joy to the Home, and other books teaches Real Estate Investing and Design Psychology. For more articles, tips, reports, newsletters, and sales flyer template, see http://www.doghousetodollhousefordollars.com/pages/5/index.htm

MORE RESOURCES:

Real estate bust: Toledo wins at Big House - San Francisco Chronicle

Great Food, Good Drinks and Luxury Real Estate on Main Street - Eastside Business Journal

BIZ DATA: Boulder real estate foreclosures - Daily Camera

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Real estate growth strategies in focus - Gulf Daily News

table border=0 width= valign=top cellpadding=2 cellspacing=7trtd width=80 align=center valign=topfont style=font-size:85%;font-family:arial,sans-serifa href=http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=Tct=us/3i-0fd=Rurl=http://www.ameinfo.com/171116.htmlcid=1257033209ei=ZrXySKitG5nK8ASQ5si4Bwusg=AFQjCNEmdEfesorKNBp4K61bY2srC4cgXgimg src=http://news.google.com/news?imgefp=OVxW3Ww3hKMJimgurl=www.ameinfo.com/images/news/0/64970-1111111111111.jpg width=55 height=80 alt= border=1brfont size=-2AME Info/font/a/font/tdtd valign=top class=jfont style=font-size:85%;font-family:arial,sans-serifbrdiv style=padding-top:0.8em;img alt= height=1 width=1/divdiv class=lha href=http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=Tct=us/3-0fd=Rurl=http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/Story.asp%3FArticle%3D231633%26Sn%3DBNEW%26IssueID%3D31207cid=1257033209ei=ZrXySKitG5nK8ASQ5si4Bwusg=AFQjCNF0xGJ6fIiaTGRFEhvz0aa2QSwoEQbReal estate/b growth strategies in focus/abrfont size=-1font color=#6f6f6fGulf Daily News,nbsp;Bahrainnbsp;-/font nobr2 hours ago/nobr/fontbrfont size=-1GROWTH strategies for the breal estate/b sector amid the global economic downturn will be discussed at a major conference in Bahrain next month. b.../b/fontbrfont size=-1a href=http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=Tct=us/3-1fd=Rurl=http://www.ameinfo.com/171116.htmlcid=1257033209ei=ZrXySKitG5nK8ASQ5si4Bwusg=AFQjCNEmdEfesorKNBp4K61bY2srC4cgXgStephen Lee is coming to Bahrain/a font size=-1 color=#6f6f6fnobrAME Info/nobr/font/fontbrfont class=p size=-1a class=p href=http://news.google.com/news?sourceid=navclientie=ISO-8859-1rls=GGLG,GGLG:2005-22,GGLG:enncl=1257033209hl=ennobrall 2 news articles/nobr/a/font/div/font/td/tr/table

Making fortunes from real estate investment - The Punch

Bushnell looks at life and real estate in the Village - eTaiwan News

Hypo Real Estate Denies Report It Withheld Data on Liquidity - Bloomberg

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Real-estate agents, mortgage brokers hurting - Bolingbrook Sun

Real estate in Acadiana and Wall Street - The Daily Advertiser

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Sunday Real Estate Round-Up, 10/12/08 - Luxist

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Real-Estate - Google News

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