How to Sell Your Home Smart

Jan. 26, 2008— -- In today's sluggish market, the prospect of selling your home can be daunting and extremely stressful.

Gone are the days when a home was sold in two weeks. Gone are the days of selling your home at the asking price. Gone are the days when most any real estate agent could sell a home simply because of a hot market and high demand.

Those have been replaced by days -- no, weeks -- of lowering your asking price and finding the best real estate agent in town. Even then, it could be months before the deal is closed.

Strategy is key to playing this new game, and the best advice anyone will give a potential seller is be prepared.

Dan McGinn, the author of "House Lust: America's Obsession With Our Homes" and Newsweek national correspondent, spoke with ABC News and offered some important tips for anyone getting ready to sell in today's market.

Stage Your Home

Staging a home refers to the way the owner or owners prepare their space to make it more enticing to a potential buyer. The goal, McGinn says, is to create a home in which "anyone can walk in the door and feel comfortable."

As the housing market has sunk, staging has become more and more important in an environment where many people are reluctant to buy. McGinn recommends using neutral color schemes and clearing out all clutter, including some furniture. Cleaning will make rooms appear bigger.

If you're not ready to get rid of all that stuff just to show off your house you can easily rent a storage unit for it until the house is off the market.

McGinn discourages home sellers from having lots of family photos and "anything that is idiosyncratically yours" prominently displayed. You may treasure that collection of ceramic gnomes, but a buyer might see them and be turned off from the whole space.

In short, the decorating needs to be generic, enough that buyers will be able to see themselves living there comfortably with the ability to adjust rooms to their taste and style.