10 Feb Refresh Your Garden For A Quicker House Sale
Exteriors are just as important as interiors when it comes to selling your property. Here are some tips on how you can refresh your garden for a quicker house sale.
So you’ve done everything the estate agent suggested to make the inside of your house more attractive to buyers, but you’re still not getting the offers you want. What can you do?
Have you thought about a garden refresh? A relatively inexpensive tidy up can work wonders for kerb appeal and for the perceived value of your property.
An attractive and well maintained garden is an assett to any property
Ways To Refresh Your Garden
- Remove rubbish and de-clutter
- Store away bikes, toys etc
- Clean patios and repair failing grout
- Straighten up the washing line
- Smarten up sheds and fences with fresh timber treatments
- Clean and treat decking
- Re-turf tired and muddy lawns
- Insert metal edging to create clean lines and a contemporary feel
- Prune and tidy overgrown shrubs
- Get rid of weeds
- Refresh the planting and give borders a fresh coat of mulch
De Cluttering And Garden Rubbish Removal
Whoever buys your home will probably want to make changes to the garden. But it’s hard for them to see the potential of the space if it’s looking sorry for itself.
Start your garden refresh by putting to one side everything that will be moving with you to your new home. If you have a friend who can store these things for you, so much the better.
Now you need to be really hard on yourself. Look at your garden through a strangers eyes. Will they want to keep what’s left? The shed that leans to one side? The damaged fence panels? The greenhouse with no glass? The wobbly bench? It goes without saying that you will leave your house clean and tidy, you need to do the same with your garden.
Removing and disposing of smaller stuff, like those 50 flower pots or last year’s grow bags is relatively simple. But you’ll probably need to hire a skip or a man with a van to take away the larger stuff.
Cleaning And Repairing Garden Features
With the clutter gone, you’ll be able to assess the state of hard landscaping features. The patios, pergolas, paths and fences that form the layout of the garden. What can you do to make them look like new again? The idea is to reassure your buyers that they can move in and start using the garden straight away.
Is your patio stained or slimy? Is there moss growing between the slabs? Are some of the pavers wobbly?
Cleaning patios properly is a skilled job involving special, eco-friendly treatments. Pressure washing can damage the surface of the stone and will almost certainly spoil the grouting.
Replacing missing grout is also a specialist job. There are plenty of YouTubers that make it look easy, but trust me, they will have had years of practice before they made their video’s. Getting the grout where you want it without staining the stones takes a lot of hand-eye co-ordination.
Smarten Up Garden Structures
You’d be amazed at how brushing off the cobwebs and applying a fresh coat of stain can help make garden structures look like new.
Timber sheds and fences in particular have a way of turning green around the gills – especially after a wet mild winter. A good clean will refresh them beautifully. Imagine how potential buyers will feel if they know they won’t have the hassle or expense of replacing the fencing.
Decking can look brand new once it has been cleaned, sanded and stained.
If you have a potting shed or a summer house, giving the inside a good sweep, and cleaning the windows will make it look much more attractive. Don’t forget to organise the contents too. I’m as guilty as anyone for just throwing stuff into the shed with a kind of “out of sight, out of mind” attitude and I know how quickly the space gets cluttered.
If you have a rotary washing line, whether or not you’ll be taking it with you, make sure it’s standing nice and straight. Somehow, wonky washing lines seem to make the whole garden look sad….or maybe that’s just me?
De cluttering your garden will make it easier for buyers to recognise its potential
Refreshing Your Beds And Borders
Low maintenance gardens are in high demand. As a landscaper, I would estimate that at least 80% of enquirers specify that their new plot should be easy to manage. Imagine taking over a new garden and finding it knee high in overgrown vegetation. That would be a off-putting for many potential buyers.
So, once again, you need to be ruthless at decluttering and refreshing beds, borders and yes, the lawn.
Start with the big stuff first – that’ll make you feel as though you’re achieving something.
The lawn is likely to be high on your list of things to improve. But a useful tip, if you are thinking of re-turfing, is to do the rest of the garden first. Once the new lawn has been laid you’d be unwise to walk on it until the grass has bedded in.
Have you got shrubby plants in your garden that have outgrown their space? Could they be pruned into shape or would it be better to remove them altogether?
Are there any plants in your garden that are obviously dead or dying? They need to go. So do any weeds.
Once the borders are looking more managed, you can either refresh the planting or give them a nice thick layer of mulch to stop the weeds coming back.
What about your pots and planters? Looking lush or clearly past their best? These are easily refreshed with some attractive but low cost plants from the garden centre. Not sure what to buy? Invest in a planting plan from Tapestry Design Studios.
Show Your Lawn Some Love
A beautiful lawn with neat borders makes a garden look more attractive and manageable
A tired lawn makes any outdoor space look just a little bit neglected. Whether it’s the grass verge outside of your house, the patch of grass in your front garden or the children’s play area out back, seeing soil and weeds peeking through patchy grass is really off-putting for a buyer. But the good news is, that re-turfing a lawn is quick and relatively inexpensive. Plus it will definitely refresh your garden.
If your lawn is in fairly good condition, a treatment with a seaweed feed will improve it’s colour in a matter of days, making it look lush, healthy and welcoming.
Keep your lawn neatly mown and don’t forget to trim those edges to make it look tidier. If your lawn edges are a big raggedy, inserting a metal edging will give your garden a very modern and manicured look and feel.
Too Busy For A Garden Refresh?
Selling your home and moving house is a frantically busy time and can be stressful. You may want to invest in the services of a skilled landscaper to refresh your garden to help sell your property quicker.
The team at Holland Landscapes have all the tools, equipment and expertise needed to clean and repair patios, paths, fences etc. Our vehicles can be used to take away waste materials and dispose of them properly and our horticulturists can tidy and refresh your planting so that your garden looks amazing. In fact – after a garden refresh from Holland Landscapes, you probably won’t want to move house after all!
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