Selling and Decluttering – The Linen Closet

Posted on July 23, 2010 
Filed Under Listing and Selling Your Home, Staging Your Home, Valerie Zinger

A Buyer for your home will open every closet door, including your linen closet.  If you have things that you would rather people not see, put them in a box.  Buyers open doors but should never be opening boxes or drawers in your furniture. Now that you know that your linen closet will be on display, declutter it before your house is on the market. 

Start by removing everything in the closet. 

1.     Wash the shelves, walls and door.

2.     Sort through your towels.  Keep one or two spare sets in the closet and pack or give away the others. If you have the room, roll some of your towels and put them in a basket in the bathroom near the tub. 

3.     Look at all your bed linen.  If you need to make space in the closet choose two sets per bed in the house.  One set is on the bed; the other is neatly folded and kept in the bedroom that contains the bed.  A neat trick is to fold the sheets and the pillow cases but keep one pillow case to be used as a bag to put the matching set inside.  This way, all you have to do is find the one bag for the bed.

4.     Look at your toiletries.  Are any stale dated?  Toss.  What about the cleaning products?  Sort through these in the same way.  Keep only what you will be using for the next few weeks and store the others in boxes in the basement/garage/storage locker.  Watch out when packing liquids.  Most movers will not allow liquids.  You might want to give your products to friends or relatives. 

5.     Have you got photographs, games, wrapping paper and ribbons and a myriad of other things in the linen closet?  Consider putting these away in boxes for the move.  The less you have in the closet the bigger it will look.  Stage it so that Buyers can imagine their own things in the closet.

6.     When everything is sorted, stack what you will keep in the closet. 

7.     Don’t be tempted to put an air freshener in the closet.  If you must, buy some lavender sachets and put them between the bed sheets. It will give a faint smell and is good aromatherapy for sleeping.

 

Please your Buyer with an organized and clean linen closet.

Photo credit:  118/365: Towels, Again @ http://www.flickr.com/photos/playfullibrarian/3498846572/

Photo credit:  Lavender square @ http://www.flickr.com/photos/dichohecho/3800608793/

 

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