How to Sell Your Home ... In One Week!

Sept. 26, 2006 — -- The Freunds live in a typical bilevel home in Toms River, N.J.

They moved into the house in 1978, paying $52,000.

"We moved to Toms River 28 years ago when we had two small children, and now the neighborhood's changing again, and it's turning back into a young family neighborhood again," Ginnie Freund said.

The couple are moving to Florida for retirement, but their home has been on the market for six months.

"We made a decision to sell our home a year ago. … But our son was still in school," Cliff Freund said. "And so we delayed actually putting the house up on the market until April, and now we find ourselves in basically a down market with a challenge to sell our home."

Sell This House in a Week?

"Good Morning America" real estate contributor Barbara Corcoran is taking on the Freunds' challenge; she will try to sell their home in just one week.

What makes a house hard to sell?

Here are a few things Corcoran noticed first about the Freunds' house.

The outside is the first impression a buyer will get. The Freunds have a great front yard, with mature trees and a well-tended garden.

There are a few things she would change, though.

"I would take the plantings out underneath that pear tree just because it foreshortens the yard and makes the whole thing look smaller," Corcoran said.

"Secondly, this driveway, which is a status symbol, beautiful driveway, has a lot of stains. I would steam clean this as well. A cheap thing to do but an important change," she said.

Corcoran also noticed the owner's name on the house -- and that's a no-no.

"You want to get rid of anything that's personal in the house because you want the buyer to walk in and feel like it's theirs. So you want to get rid of anything personal," she said.

Inside the house, Corcoran immediately noticed some problems.

Get rid of the clutter. "There are three things wrong with this house, and it's true of every single room here," she said. "The clutter. There's clutter everywhere, and people can't see past clutter."

Let the light in. "Secondly, there's not enough light in this house, and yet it's a sunny house and that's because the curtain treatments are really heavy and they keep the light out. People love light."

Send your pets on vacation. "And last the house has an odor, and that's because they're living with two very loved cats, but on the day of the open house the cats have to take a little vacation so we won't know they're around."

Clean out the closets. "Every seller should know that buyers will open your closet, and they'll use it to judge how good your plumbing and electrical is. It makes no sense, but if they see a messy closet, they'll assume the inside of that house is not in good working order."

Every room needs a purpose. "The purpose of a room should be perfectly clear when a buyer walks in. This [spare] room, I'm not sure what the purpose of this room is, it's got an ironing board, a small sofa here. It should either be a den or a bedroom, and because it's not it's going to cost the seller a lot of money."