When it’s time to sell your house, your priority should be picking an ideal closing time frame, and ultimately a moving date. You need to decide when you need to be at your next destination, whether it’s a rental, a new home, or an interim stop on the way to your final destination. Most of the time sellers have a vague idea of when they need to be out of their home. Your time frame will compress as the vague idea turns into a firm date. Once your house hits the public market you need to be prepared to pack and move.

To alleviate the stress of timing, packing, and moving here are three helpful tips:

Contact a Moving Company. Let them know you are selling your house and moving. Ask about a storage unit or a pod for short-term use while you are packing your house. Ideally you should secure a spot where you can start moving your belongings “out” of the house prior to photos. Packing and moving items that you don’t use every day out of the house and into a storage unit or pod jump starts the process. Be ruthless. Let’s face it, you aren’t going to be baking muffins or making a cheesecake in that spring form pan, pack ‘em up!

Pick a Date for the Moving Truck. Even before your house is under contract communicate with the movers. Throw out hypothetical dates to check on their availability. If a buyer makes an offer on your house the offer will have a closing date – this is the date that the buyers will buy your house. You need to be moved “out” prior to this date. For example, if the closing date is December 19th, you and your belongings need to be “out” of the house ideally by December 17th, so you have a day to clean prior to the buyer’s walk through.

Find a Place to Stay. Let’s be real, moving is chaos. You won’t have items that you usually use in your daily routine during the move-out. Once the movers have moved all the items that are going on the truck you will still have your personal items, pets, and maybe even special plants in tow. To alleviate this stress, we suggest moving to another place prior to “moving truck day.” Gather your clothes, toothbrushes, etc. and camp at a friend’s house or a hotel for a few nights while preparing for the movers. It will be a respite from the endless boxes and keep you organized.

These are just a few tips based on our “real life” experiences with sellers. If you have been thinking about selling, we are happy to meet with you to start the process and set you up for a successful move. Contact us to get started!