Home Selling Guide
When you sell your home with Barker Realty, you leverage the power of our experience, market knowledge, and technology. Every member of your Barker selling team prioritizes a single goal—to help you sell your home for the best price possible and in the shortest possible time.
Ready to Sell
Marketing Your Home with Barker Realty
Locally owned and operated with deep roots in Santa Fe history, Barker Realty operates differently than most real estate brokerages. We give each of our sellers personal attention throughout every step of the home-selling process, thanks to the high caliber of our brokers and a home marketing system supported by a completely digital transaction process that utilizes checklists, calendars, digital signatures, and notifications to ensure a smooth selling process.
Pricing Your Home
Pricing your home correctly is a critical early step in the home-selling process. Your Barker Realty broker will carry out a comparative market analysis (CMA) that compares your home to recently sold homes in your area. “Recently sold” may equate to anywhere from six months to a year, depending on current market conditions.
Factors that go into a comparative market analysis include the location, age, and condition of your home. A CMA will also compare your home to recently sold homes with similar characteristics such as the number of bedrooms and bathrooms, square foot of living space, and lot size.
If your home has features such as a home office, guest quarters or an in-law suite, or a swimming pool, the CMA may include similarly featured properties.
Although there’s no industry-wide standard for a CMA report, it will typically include:
- Three to five comparable properties
- A description of each property
- The square footage of each property
- The sales price of each comp
- Dollar adjustments for any differences between the subject property and the comparables
- The adjusted sold price per square foot of each comp
- The fair market value of the subject property
Getting Ready to List Your Home
In today’s competitive real estate market, a lot goes into getting a home ready to list. Your Barker Realty broker will take your selling timeline into account when tackling the following:
Updates and Repairs
Your Barker broker may recommend making updates and repairs designed to bring you the best return on investment (ROI). Their recommendations may include repainting in neutral colors and making sure all home systems are functioning properly.
Decluttering and Depersonalizing
This is a key step, especially if you’ve been living in your home for many years. Every home accumulates clutter that homeowners might not even notice. And every home has personal touches such as family photographs, memorabilia, and collections that can include everything from hats to walking sticks.
Decluttering means clearing floors and surfaces to make rooms look bigger and more spacious. Kitchen counters are prime candidates for decluttering. Before your listing photos are taken, stow small appliances and cleaning equipment. Bathrooms should be cleared of toiletries and personal care items. The ultimate goal for both kitchens and bathrooms are clear surfaces so that buyers can focus on those stunning stone countertops—not your brand of coffee or toothpaste.
Home Staging
Home staging has grown in importance with the advent of real estate-themed cable TV shows. In fact, in a recent National Association of REALTORS® study on home staging 61 percent of agents said such TV shows set higher expectations of how homes should look.
Your Barker Realty broker is the best judge of whether your home sale would benefit from staging. Studies show that the most commonly staged rooms are the living room, followed by the kitchen, primary bedroom, and dining room. In today’s work-from-home culture, more sellers are staging home offices as well.
Launching Your Listing
Barker Realty leads Santa Fe’s largest brokerages with the lowest average days on market (DOM). Our listings show why.
Listing Photos
Your Barker Realty listing broker will work with a professional photographer to take photos once your home prep is complete. Your Barker broker will ensure that photos are well-lit and include outdoor living spaces as well as key interior spaces. Many Santa Fe homes for sale feature magnificent landscape views. Your Barker broker will be certain to add them.
Video Tours and Matterport 3D Virtual Tours
A Barker Realty listing stands out in today’s marketplace for an increasingly important reason: More people are buying homes remotely. Barker listings include video tours and 3D virtual tours that cater to today’s home buyers. Barker’s video tours narrated by our brokers elevate digital walkthroughs in a way that static images cannot. Our 3D virtual tours are powered by Matterport, giving viewers the ability to virtually zoom through rooms on every level of the home. Our video tours and Matterport tours are carried out only when your home has been prepped to perfection.
Syndicating
Once we enter your property into our multiple listing service (MLS), it will be automatically shared with hundreds, if not thousands, of real estate websites. This includes Realtor.com, Zillow, Trulia, and many other niche-focused sites.
Social Media
Our social media strategy maximizes your listing via Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube, targeting your property to reach the right audience at the right time. Our weekly Virtual Open Houses streamed live on Facebook and Instagram allow buyers to experience your property from any device, anywhere in the world.
Print Ads and Direct Mail
We’re proud of our high-quality print ads and direct mail pieces designed by our in-house marketing team. We maintain relationships with such local publications as the Santa Fe New Mexican, Real Estate Guide, Pasatiempo, Fine Lifestyles and more.
Prospective buyers often come from neighbors who recommend your area and listing. So our home marketing strategy includes “Just Listed” postcards sent to your nearest neighbors once your property is for sale.
Tips for Showing Your Home
Santa Fe homes sell during every season of the year. Although we’re seeing more homes bought remotely, viewing homes in person is still a mainstay of the Santa Fe real estate scene. Follow these tips to make the most of open houses and viewings.
Create a Landing Zone
Home buyers often remove their footwear before viewing a home. Placing a chair or bench just inside the entryway creates a landing zone that makes it easy for buyers to sit and remove shoes.
Turn on the AC or Heat
Make sure your home is at a comfortable temperature when it’s time for an open house or viewing. Buyers will linger longer if your home is properly cool or warm. If your home has a fireplace and is on the market during the winter, consider lighting a fire to create a cozy atmosphere.
Lighten and Brighten
Before home viewings, turn on all lights and open all curtains and blinds. Part of preparing your home for sale includes checking to make sure all light fixtures are functioning and equipped with warm lightbulbs. Prepping a home for sale should also include cleaning windows inside and out. Clean windows admit more sunshine, making interiors look brighter.
Leave Doors Ajar
Some home buyers refrain from entering rooms unless doors are open. Leaving doors open will encourage buyers to examine every room of your home. Be sure to include bathrooms and closets. Storage space is important to buyers. Closet doors don’t need to be wide open, simply ajar.
Vacate the Premises
Of course, you’ll leave the premises during an open house or home viewing, and take any pets with you.
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