Preparing Your Home For Listing Photos

Listing photos are the first chance many potential buyers get to be exposed to your home. This is why being prepared for listing photos and ensuring your home looks ready to sell is a key part in the home listing process. Here are some tips to prepare your home for listing photos!

Clear Off Kitchen Counters & Sink

When the kitchen counters are completely cleared off, buyers can imagine how they might use the space for themselves. Kitchen items and decor only distract buyers can often make the kitchen feel cluttered. You will want to remove everything except a handful of decorative items from the countertops and thoroughly clean all surfaces.

Clear & Clean Bathroom Sinks, Tubs, and Showers

Take all of your bath/shower items and place them into a bin that can go underneath the sink. This can help your bathroom look bigger.  Clear off the counters so that bathrooms look unused, but it is okay to leave clean hand towels and hand soap.

Replace Burned Out Light Bulbs

Make sure you check all of the ceiling lights, lamps, and exterior lights to make sure that they all work and can correctly illuminate your space. If there are dark areas in your home, feel free to add a few extra lamps to brighten them up. Additional light can make an area look more spacious so the more light, the better!

Turn On All Lights Throughout The Entire House

You want your home to be captured in the best light, and so it is essential to have as much light as possible. Before your photographer comes, turn on all of the lights in the house!

Open All Windows

Natural light from windows brings life to photos. Opening all of the window treatments in your home to let in as much light as possible. If it's too bright, your photographer can adjust as needed. Make sure you clean the windows if they will be photographed!

Remove Unnecessary Furniture & Decorations

This is probably the hardest part, but it's one of the most important. Removing and storing furniture that doesn’t bring value to your photos can be hard, but it opens up the floor space and helps to not distract potential buyers. Buyers want to be able to visualize their items in your home and that can be hard to do if the room is cluttered with furniture.

Turn All Ceiling Fans, TVs, and Computer Screens Off

Any moving items like ceiling fans or active TV/Computer screens can look very strange in photos.  You should turn off anything that moves or can cause a motion blur.

Clear Off Appliance Surfaces 

Be sure to remove photos, magnets, notes, reminders, and other personal information from the refrigerator or any other appliance you have decorated. It will not only make your home appear cleaner, but it also keeps your personal info safe.

Make All of the Beds

Be sure to make and decorate all the beds in your home with matching sheets, blankets, and pillows. Use bedding fits correctly and covers the mattress.

Are you thinking of selling or know someone who is? Please share our information and give us a call to discuss your selling options. Maria Zendejas & Team (805) 465-2000

We look forward to being your Realtors! 

Need Space? Ditch Your Dining Room!

More and more, we're on the go. Dinners have evolved and formal dining is becoming a way of the past - or is reserved just for special occasions. With that in mind, we see more and more often that dining rooms are left untouched a mass majority of the year. Many people still have fully furnished dining rooms, for a few reasons. They may have been told they can’t sell their home without one, or they already have a dining set, or it just hadn’t occurred to them to not have one.

If you’re willing to think outside the box and you’re looking for ways to have more room without financing a home addition, take a second to think about what you really need and don’t need in your home. There’s a good chance that maybe, you don’t really need a dining room.

A better solution might be to create a slightly larger, less formal dining space. A space that can be more flexible, taking the place of the formal dining room and the breakfast room. Most of the time, this other dining space works great for meals, crafts, and everything in between. You can just add a nice tablecloth, some candles and once again it is a temporary space for elegant dining. If space allows, you can add a nook to your kitchen (if you haven’t already) and completely remove your formal dining furniture from your dining room. Now, you have a full room for play, design, or maybe an office - it’s up to you!

If you've been thinking of selling to purchase a home that offers more space, finding out it's resale value is the place to start! Contact us for a free report of your home. Maria Zendejas & Team can be reached via phone (805) 465-2000 or email lupezendejas@aol.com

When To Purchase Flood Insurance

If you are in an area where you think you might need flood insurance, you also might be wondering if and when the best time to purchase is. Like many Americans, the threat of a flood may always seem far off but if you are in an area that has any flood risk, the best time to consider making the investment is as soon as possible. 

Home insurance will not pay to repair damage caused by flooding, which is why you’ll need to buy separate flood insurance to cover tropical storms, torrential rain and overflowing rivers. It’s the smart move to buy flood insurance before flooding becomes imminent, because there is typically a waiting period between the time you buy your policy and the time it takes effect. 

Waiting period for flood insurance

If you buy your flood insurance policy through the National Flood Insurance Program, your home coverage will kick in 30 days from the purchase date. If you decide to buy private flood insurance, the waiting period might be shorter - typically around 2 weeks. Because not every state/area has private sellers, you will want to ask your home insurer or agent about options in your area. Unfortunately if flooding occurs during the blackout period, your policy won’t pay to fix damage to your home or belongings.

When the waiting period doesn’t apply

Here are some scenarios that are exceptions to the NFIP waiting period, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency:

You have flood insurance and increase your coverage at renewal time. The new limits of your policy will take effect once your old policy expires.

You buy flood insurance within 13 months after your home is added to a Special Flood Hazard Area. The waiting period is one day in these cases. 

Your home sits on burned federal land and post-wildfire conditions put your property at an increased risk of flooding. There may be no waiting period if you buy your policy within 60 days of the date the fire is contained.

You buy flood insurance in relation to getting, increasing, extending or renewing your mortgage. There’s no waiting period in these cases.

There might also be exceptions to the waiting periods for private policies, including if you’re switching from an NFIP policy to a private one. You will want to ask your insurer for more details.