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HOME : Top Six Tips for a Successful Downsizing Submitted
Downsizing Tip #1: De-clutter, do it once and
save money
De-cluttering to make the house look best for
showing is advice often given by real estate
agents, but it may lead to a lot of extra work,
complication and expense that can be
avoided. Making the house look its best for
showing is an important consideration, but
often what's overlooked is the fact that the
option to de-clutter (throw-away, give-away,
bulk-sale at a significant discount, or sending
off to auction at the cost of packing and
moving) needs to be repeated again when you
move out.
Handling items multiple times increases your
costs and reduces the cash you might recover
from selling your goods.
Solution: Clear out just the pure garbage,
donation or recycling items. Instead of moving
out useful items that could be sold, pack them
up and place them out of the way in closets or
a side room in a tidy fashion. Later when the
house is sold, you can pull out those items for
sale along with the other items you are not
going to be taking with you. In this case, the
house looks tidy, it's less work and leaves
more money in your pocket!
Downsizing Tip #2: Avoid making the closing
date and the moving date the same
Closing and moving on the same day can
create a lot of unnecessary stress and
complication as you sort out what to take,
what to sell and what to throw away while
coming up against a hard deadline.
Often sellers think they need to live in their
home right until closing day. Remaining in
your home throughout the process can create
extra stress, management, and complications.
Many downsizing seniors have the flexibility to
plan their move in advance of the closing. This
offers a number of advantages.
Solution: Plan to move a few weeks before the
sale of your house closes. This way you can
move out the items you want to keep, but have
some flexibility in case you forgot something
or something doesn't fit. With what you're
keeping out of the house, what's left can more
easily be sold.
Downsizing Tip #3: Don't put useful items that
have little value in a dumpster
Many tend to see a lot of used goods as simply
waste, but it is a shame to see useful goods
going into a landfill.
It's sometimes hard to see who would want a
worn or tired item, so many sellers assume
their only option is to throw it away. For items
that are still useable, can be repaired or used
for parts, there is often a buyer. You can be
environmentally friendly and make money at
the same time by finding a way to sell those
items.
Solution: Use the power of the Internet to
expose your unwanted items to a much wider
audience than traditional alternatives. Sushee
Perumal noted that, "Our service consistently
find new homes for goods that would have
otherwise been thrown out. This means the
seller and buyers can reduce their carbon
footprint, take pressure off landfills and reuse
the goods without impeding the sale of the
house."
Downsizing Tip #4: Put the power of
competitive bidding to work on your higher
value items too
Sellers often guess at the value of their goods
and may take the first offer that comes close
to their expectation. This may mean missing
out on other buyers who are willing to pay
much more. On the other hand, if no offers
come close to the sellers expectation, the
item may be left unsold.
This is particularly important for higher value
goods where the value may be difficult to
determine and potential buyers may be
difficult to find. Instinctively we know that a
one-on-one negotiation may not bring the best
deal and we want to hear what others are
willing to offer. Without competitive bidding
from a number of interested potential buyers,
it is difficult to know if you will be getting a
reasonable return for your more valuable
items.
Solution: Maxsold's YouBidLocal offering is a
fully managed online auction service that
connects many potential buyers in a
competitive bidding situation. Masold's
YouBidLocal offering sells a wide variety of
high value household goods including
jewellery, silver, cars, boats, and artwork.
Even very exotic collectibles are sold this way.
Some items may attract more than you
expected, some less, but you can have
confidence that competitive bidding delivered
a reasonable sale price in your timeline.
Downsizing Tip #5: Once you decide to sell an
item, don't set a reserve or minimum price
An old saying goes: Your item is worth
whatever you say it's worth as long as it's not
for sale. When you want to sell it, it only
matters what someone will pay.
It's a trap to think that having a reserve
ensures that you get the price you want for an
item. In fact, what it often means is that you
don't sell the item just when you need the
house empty for closing. This is fine for those
who truly want to keep the item, but in the
context of downsizing this approach can add
effort and stress that you don't need. It also
means making tougher choices about how to
sell or otherwise dispose of valuable goods or,
potentially, paying years of storage fees.
Solution: Use competitive bidding to get the
best price you can and encourage lots of
bidders to start bidding with no reserve
prices. Once engaged, let the excitement of
by MaxSold.com
the auction process encourage them to bid
prices up to what they are willing to pay.
Auction leverages the natural competitive
forces of the marketplace to drive prices to
their highest level within a given time frame.
Maxsold's YouBidLocal service makes it easy
for lots of people to compete.
Downsizing Tip #6: Choose a low stress
approach to selling your unwanted items
Selling the unwanted contents of your house
can be challenging and time consuming, but it
doesn't have to be that way. You are busy
enough with the move and don't need more
stress at this point in your life.
Listing items for sale in the classified section
of newspapers or online with eBay, Craigslist
or Kijiji, can result in a lot of phone calls and
emails. These inquiries (e.g., whether the item
is still for sale, its features and condition, a
time it can be seen and negotiations about the
price) can be quite a burden. Allowing
strangers to come into your home to inspect
can also be a security concern. This approach
may not be suitable or desirable for people
with lots of items to sell.
Tag sales (also known as content sales) are
like a super sized garage sale. A price is
tagged to each item and the public is invited
to come in on a particular day to buy. It can be
a chaotic environment that is difficult to
control if a lot of people show up. The owner
may be concerned about damage to the home
and potential theft of items. A thorough paper
trail of what each item sold for may be
lacking. At the end of it all, 30% or more of the
contents may be left unsold. All this can add
unnecessary stress to your move.
Bulk buyers may come in and give you one
price to take it all away. They make their
money on reselling the higher value goods and
will assign little (sometimes negative) value to
much of your contents. You may end up with
pennies on the dollar and concerns about how
many of your items will end up in the landfill.
For many people this approach is not an
option.
Solution: MaxSold's YouBidLocal online
auction service can put all of your contents
online for competitive bidding with a complete
paper trail of for what each item sold. The inhome
preview and pickup are tightly
controlled and monitored by professional staff
with great respect for your property. No
money changes hands on-site as all payments
are taken online. The result is that within two
weeks practically everything is sold and the
house is empty, ready for the closing, with
next to no effort or stress for you.
Call MaxSold at 1-888-672-3677 to schedule
to a free consultation today. Visit
MaxSold.com to see the Top 5 Mistakes
People Make When Selling Things.
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