What makes you think you’re so special?

By rerockstar • June 30th, 2010

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Kids say the darndest things.

I overheard a few kids talking the other day, and one of them turned to the other, looked at him with a deadpan expression and said, “What makes you think you’re so special?” The kid delivered with more than a bit of snarky attitude and you could tell he was a) imitating an adult who recently said it to him or b) saying it with tongue firmly planted in cheek. I laughed and went about my business. Today, during a conversation with a home owner, the phrase popped back into my head. We were talking about their home and I asked if there was anything that they thought made their home special.

If I were to ask you “what makes you so special?,” without any indication of irony or humor, you might slap me in the face. What if I asked you the same question about your home? “What makes you think your home is so special?“

Your competition doesn’t think you’re special.

When you put your home on the market, you need to spruce up your home and make it shine, we all know that. Therein lies the problem, every seller in your San Antonio neighborhood has been given the same tips on how to best present their home to get it sold. (Of course, there are always those that ignore this advice.) No matter what you do to your home to make it stand out from the pack, there is always someone doing the same things to their home.

So what’s a seller to do? In today’s often competitive San Antonio market, you need to be the best on your block, not the second best, if you want to sell for top dollar without sitting on the market for month after month.

You need to go above and beyond and make your home memorable. I had a listing last year (during the drought) that was sold in eight days – the buyers commented that they fell in love with the house because the grass was greener than any other home they had previously looked at – imagine that! The house was immaculate and staged perfectly, but what caught their eye? The green grass after seeing countless homes with burnt out yards. It’s not always the common elements like cleanliness, smell, staging, etc., that people walk away with memories of (although none of those should be overlooked).

When I moved to San Antonio I insisted our new home not have the master bedroom downstairs. What did we buy? A house with the master downstairs. Despite my steadfast dislike of the master bedroom being on the first floor, we still bought a home with that feature. Why? We were so blown away by the deck and backyard. The grass was lush and green, flowers were growing everywhere, and the deck didn’t have a leaf or speck of dirt on it. It was special. The inside of the house had plenty of things I didn’t like about it, but that backyard had exactly what I wanted and more. Not every buyer will love what’s special about your home, but when one does, look out – you’ll be on your way to the closing table.

Make your home special. Find that interesting piece of the puzzle and intensify it. Make your home stand out from all the other homes that the buyer just looked at in the humid San Antonio summer. Don’t be ordinary – make buyers want your house with a passion. Need help finding out what makes your home so special? Contact me and let’s see what we can find.

photo courtesy of TheeErin