Moving and having a home on the market is never easy or fun, but with little ones it’s crazy! We have (not our smartest moves) moved a couple of times since having Elijah. They don’t have any idea what keeping things clean means, and then you have to take them out of the house for hours at a time while showings are happening.
But you need it sold, so you have to do it! I’ve got some tips to make it just a little easier.
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Purge and reduce before it hits the market. This goes for your stuff and theirs. The less there is available to make a mess of, the easier it will be to clean up after them when you have limited notice about a showing. I moved most of our toys up to our playroom while we were having showings. If the playroom was the one area I couldn’t get to, at least it was just the playroom.
Baskets and boxes are your best friends! If you don’t already have tons of these used for storage around your house, now is the time to get them! You can just shove all of your stuff into a pretty basket!
Stage your home for quicker sale. For our home, it was kind of ironic that it was the cleanest and most decorated it had been right as we are selling it. You want to remove as much clutter and personal items as you can. Make your home look like a model home!
Have a bag full of getting out activities. We have this backpack for Elijah and we love these sticker books for activites. Coloring books also work great as well as these water coloring books. A few cars are always a hit as well.(or whatever toys your kids love, we have boys so cars are all we know.)
If the weather is nice, plan some hikes or walks to get out! If parks are open when you are reading this, find some new ones to go get some energy out! If you have a baby (we had a 3-4 month old 2 times that we moved), put them in a carrier and head into Target to wander while they hopefully nap. Some Targets even have nursing rooms now!
Remove anything you don’t want touched. The fact is that people will bring kids, and kids don’t listen. As great as they are they still can’t always keep their hands to themselves. Keep this in mind when deciding what to leave out in your home. And it’s not just kids either by the way – I had an adult waltz their muddy feet all over my white rug in the nursery of our half million dollar house that we sold. Consider getting some shoe coverings to require. Not trying to scare you, but these are things I didn’t consider!
Remember, the people coming to look at your house are just people too. There is a good chance they have also sold a house or also have kids and will understand if it doesn’t look 100% perfect.
Also let them eat the cake and run like crazy! This isn’t easy for them either and they didn’t ask for it. Remember to bring little bits of sunshine into the craziness! Remember that you can either thrive and have fun or be stressed and mad!
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