Kids, Dogs and Showings – How to Keep Your Home ‘Show-Ready’ When LIFE Happens

When your property is on the market it can be a stressful time.

The key to selling the house is getting more house-showings – and house-showings are often scheduled on a last-minute basis.

That’s why home-sellers are expected to keep the house in “show” condition all the time.

But let’s face it, there are ‘dark forces’ that threaten to derail your grand-scheme of selling your home at record speed and for top-dollar.

What are these dark-forces?

That’s right, kids, dogs, and even work.

So cuddly and full of life, but, seemingly, diabolically opposed to your mission of keeping the house looking immaculate so you can sell quickly, right?

One day moment the house is spotless and the next day moment the carpet is covered with a paw-shaped trail of mud spots, tracked in by ‘Spot’ himself!

You hit the ceiling knowing you have a house showing in just 2 hours.

In this moment, you pray that all the toys, all the laundry and all the spots from that little pooch would just…disappear.

You desperately wish all of the showings could just fall on one day of the week and not be so spread out throughout the week. You feel like the juggle between everyday life and selling your home is driving you bonkers.

You know you can’t kick the dog, the gold fish and the kids in the middle of winter – just until you sell the house – so what other bright ideas are available?

After all, a great showing is the primary driver that leads to a quick sale at top dollar price.

What you need is a fat-break clean-up plan that can easily be executed in no more than two hours.

That’ way, when you get that phone call asking for a showing at 6 pm and it’s 3:47 pm right now, you’re confident because you’ve got a plan.

Here are a few things that may help you prepare for showings:

Assign each person in your home a task. This assumes that you have older children who can properly clean areas and not merely smear dirt around. This is the one major thing in your home cleaning checklist that needs to be done prior to the showing. The task would be in addition to making sure their room is clean, the bed is made, their curtains are open and their lights are on.

For a child who can help with the dishes, their task could be loading the dishwasher. Someone else’s task could be vacuuming, while someone else goes behind with the Swiffer. You should have someone on bathroom duty, cleaning them daily and ensuring they smell good.

Purchase baskets that will fit under each bed and use them for the everyday items that are left out, but that you want to hide during a showing. (Your daughter’s blanky, toys, clothes, etc).

All of these everyday items will go in the basket, tucked away during the showing and then can be easily pulled out after the showing.

As hard as it is, try to choose one thing every day to clean. Whether it is the laundry, the dishes, filing away papers, organizing the kids or dog’s toys, sweeping, mopping & vacuuming all the floors, etc. This will help eliminate the need for excessive panic before showings.

Having a game-plan for keeping the house in tip-top shape for showing is a must.

So, it’s important to have a family huddle and map out your fast-break clean-up plan that can be executed by all available members of the household, in less than 2 hours.