I like your colors a lot. Keep them. We had a realtor who specialized in staging come and look at our house. She liked the lighter (not pastel) neutral shades we already had, but didn't like the darker ones (dining room had a navy blue below chair rail). Her reasoning was that you want to give the impression that the new owners could move right in without changing a thing. Although many on this forum would not rule out a house based on paint color, young families who ae very busy, do not want to take the time to do one thing. She said you mainly want a sense of flow from space to space - nothing jarring. It was recommended to replace different shades of carpeting in bedrooms with one neutral shade or hard wood, if affordable. I'm sticking to colors on the SW Nomadic Desert/Latte strips for the downstairs living area including foyer and hallways, except painting the kitchen Clary Sage (after removing the wallpaper). Upstairs in the bedrooms, I'm going with SW Krypton in some rooms and SW Comfort Gray in the rest. We have hardwood under our carpeting upstairs, so will remove the carpeting and clean up the wood as well as we can. New owner may want to recarpet or may not like the carpet we chose if we spent the $$$ to recarpet. Giving the impression that the home is spotlessly clean and well maintained and free of clutter is very important. Your house looks wonderful and I'm sure you will not have trouble selling it.

CMarlin--I've been reading through this thread, wondering if he meant the 1860's maybe? We recently sold a 1920's house and moved into a 1950's one--and consider NEITHer of those 'old' (we live in an area where it's not uncommon to see homes that date back to the 1700's, even occasionally the 1600's). OP--Fix anything that's truly broken--leaking pipes, for example, dripping faucets. CLEAN CLEAN CLEAN! If YOU want the chandeliers, then take them down and put up something else, otherwise, leave them. Don't spend money you don't have to--you're unlikely to get it back. As to staging--make the rooms look as comfortable, but uncluttered as possible. But not if that means spending money for furniture you won't need later. I do think, the one place it makes sense to spend a few $$$ is for window treatments--but don't go overboard. Go to a place like Marburn Curtains and pick up some inexpensive, but decent looking things. Other inexpensive things you might consider--a fresh coat of paint doesn't cost much and can make a room look much cleaner. If you're in the mood and have wallpaper? It might be worth removing it and painting. In all honesty, the house we sold recently had been listed twice. In between those listings, we did strip and paint the only 2 rooms with wall paper. Don't know if it 'sold' the house, but the first time around, we had little interest. Second time around, we had a younger, more enthusiastic agent (and those newly painted walls) and it sold in under 6 weeks. But again, it's not worth putting a lot of dollars into getting the house ready to sell--most people want a blank slate that they can personalize to their own tastes. You just have to offer them a home where they can see the potential possibilities. You are in a bit of a tricky area--a 60's house isn't old enough to be a classic, but it's not new enough to be new. But you only need to find the one right buyer who falls in love with it. Hoping you'll find them sooner rather than later.

We've decided to go ahead and move all the boxes I've packed and the furniture that has been redacted from the rooms (now residing in the attic) to storage in our new home state. DH is coming home next week and wants to load up a truck to take back. He's crazy, but I love him. I'm trying to locate a professional home stager but it is not easy when you live in L.A. (lower Alabama) I need help getting them in the front door - that has been our biggest problem, then the inside. I don't want to spend another dime on the house without real professional advice rather than real estate agents who have had "classes." Obviously, their advice hasn't worked. I read up on them and thier fees and it appears that you can get a variety of services from an initial consultation, to a stage using your stuff, then one with their stuff and on up. I tried to get one earlier but she never returned my call, probably cause most of the interior designers work for builders and don't have time for us little folks. I think if you are in a slow market and have a hard house to sell it would be best to consult with a professional. Just my .02 cents.

I live in a place where location trumps just about everything. On top of that, very few houses are individual, they tended to be built as groups, so there are a number of identical or slightly different houses. But people here tend to pay attention to the inside, and the amenities, and not so much what the exterior looks like. Like I said before, since you would be moving into a neighborhood that contained similar houses, I don't think there would be any benefit to spending money to change the essential character of the house. (Like there might be if the mansard was anomaly). It would make sense to make it look like the most pleasant-looking example of whatever it is. You might like it better on the outside if you change it, but it doesn't really benefit its position in the neighborhood. I am not sure that it would necessarily be any more difficult to sell than anything else in the neighborhood--because it fits in the neighborhood as is. Again I will cite robo's example of the house that was converted. I think when you really analyze the outcome, it doesn't look any better than the original. I think there is an initial reaction of "great they got rid of the mansard" but when you really look, I think the new look may actually be even more awkward than the old. It just references something that we are more used to. I've said it before, but I live in a pretty ugly house. There are four slightly different ones. I bought it because the architect understood floorplans and getting light into the interior. I could have a house that looked better on the outside in the same neighborhood, but it would be darker and more cobbled together inside. But the "improvements" that a couple of my neighbors have made only serve to make their houses look worse. They are trying to compensate for something but not in the right way, really. So I think if you are looking primarily at location, you should really consider how the houses you look at "feel" on the inside, and not so much the face that they present to the street. (Since it's a development with similar houses). You really want something that works well inside, where you are actually doing the living rather than something that looks good on the outside--if you can't have both.