Well, interesting turn of events. Our house is not yet listed, we are getting the house ready with the plan to list by the end of the month after we get some bigger things completed (namely recarpeting upstairs and a porch repair). We have our listing agent selected and she is aware of our plan. Last night I got a call from her that she received a call from another REA with a party interested in a house in only my subdivision. Inventory is very scarce and he has seen and dismissed the two houses currntly on the market in the subdivions. She was calling to see if my REA knew of anything else coming available. So, they are coming to look at our house tonight. Not enough time to do any more changes obviously. While I am realistic that this ideal situation will probably amount to nothing, I am happy to have a chance to do a trial run and get some preliminary feedback. About the office situation - I agree that this would be the perfect set up. However, we have an office upstairs, and it isn't the pretty little wood desk office, or I would have just relocated it. It's a big L-shaped metal "working" desk that is definitely form over function. I appreciate all the suggestions and will keep you posted!

We got advice from a stager and it seemed to work, as we sold the house very quickly (12 days) in the depth of the market. -- remove everything personal-photos, diplomas, whatever-- you want the buyer to envision their family, which may be very different from yours, in the space -- Pottery Barn is apparently the go-to source for colors and house fashion in the buying cohort. Doesn't matter if it's ugly, just go for it -- no one wants to fix anything, no matter how trivial, so either make sure everything in the house works or get rid of it (ie torn screen door--better to take it off than leave it there needing fixed) -- fresh paint (in Pottery Barn colors) works wonders. It also forces you to clean everywhere-- move every piece of furniture. The house can not be too clean. -- refinish the floors if they are bad. Doesn't need to be a good job, it just needs to look like it doesn't need work (no one wants to fix (or paint, or refinish) anything! -- move about 2/3 of your furniture out to a remote location. empty the garage and empty the basement completely -- empty 80% of the stuff out of your cabinets and closets and put it in storage. Yes people will look inside all of them. You want to make them look big and uncrowded. -- we replaced brass cabinet knobs with brushed nickel and brass light fixtures with brushed nickel or oiled bronze. The cheap nasty ones from the Borg will do just fine. Brass is out, out, out. -- plant some pansies and mulch everything in the yard. Get rid of brush piles, rotten fences, old playground equipment, anything that looks like it might involve work to deal with. -- depending on your price level, replace the kitchen appliances with stainless. Again, they can be cheap and nasty as long as they look new and shiny. -- put new big fluffy white towels in the bathroom and new fluffy rugs on the floor. Store them between showings so that they always look new. Make the bathroom look as spa-like as possible. -- turn on every light every time you show the house Did I mention that no one wants to fix anything?

I would definitely be suggestive! Last summer my home sale fell through just before closing because of a job loss. Unfortunately, we had already moved everything out. In the two months it was empty we got a lot of negative comments about the floor plan and layout of the house. We put a table with 4 chairs in the dining room, placemats on the table, a sofa and chair in the living room, an accent table in the foyer, a chair by the fireplace in the family room, a table and 4 chairs in the breakfast nook, 2 stools by the kitchen peninsula with full place settings on the counter, one picture on the mantle, towels in the bathrooms, pillow shams and throw pillows to suggest bed placement in the bedrooms, a simple desk and chair in an extra room to suggest an office, and a tv stand to suggest TV placement in the rec room basement. In our case some of the smaller areas looked a lot bigger with a little furniture in them. Having something in each room gave it just a little more warmth, and I think it's hard for some people to make an emotional connection to an empty house. Some of the furniture we took out of our new house, some we borrowed, and some we bought at Ikea. After we did the staging we got a lot of "shows really well" comments and no more negative floor plan comments. We talked to one staging company, and they were planning to do only the living room, dining room, breakfast nook, and master bedroom.

rureadyinia - The discussions in this post have been interesting and I am truly grateful for the time people have spent! It has been an interesting side of the Berkeley real estate market that the smaller homes have been selling for more per square foot than the larger homes. I think it is because it is completely remodeled with the price point at what a larger house is “before” the renovations. (At least I think they don’t have foundation issues). The homes that are move-in ready do have a lot of appeal these days! Yet - $1000 per square foot for a smaller home about 1200 sq ft and $524 per square foot for a 2566 square foot home seems wildly disparate. And I agree about coming to this site because I do like cosmetic renovating and choosing my own counters and sinks, etc. And as much as I really like this house (and I say this out loud even) I would probably even paint the wood trim in the downstairs bedrooms white as it is darker in the downstairs. thanks for the impressions and the thoughts!