Natural Disasters and Your Home

Natural disasters are in the news lately, with recent forest fires and earthquakes in Oregon and California, and a general increase in severe weather. What can you do to prepare your home for natural disasters? What are the biggest concerns in your area?

House Logic has a useful overview, from tips for securing your home to the costs of disaster insurance: Infographic: Preparing Your Home for a Natural Disaster

Home Showing Mistakes: Item Four and Five, Critters and Oddities

I read an article in REALTOR Mag last month about the top 10 "worst home-showing offenses" - in other words, major mistakes people make when showing their homes. I'd like to share them with you, along with tips for avoiding them.

The fourth mistake is critters, specifically wild animals and pests like insects. This sounds pretty obvious, but remember: you might be accustomed to something and think of it as "no big deal," while that same thing might be an unpleasant surprise to a potential buyer. Whether it's raccoons in the backyard or boxelder bugs that are only around for a week (but during that week, they're EVERYWHERE), imagine you're seeing your home for the first time. Try to control or remove those uninvited wild guests.

Door painting tips from
DIY Home Staging Tips

The fifth mistake is "oddities," as in "oddities from home make-overs." Again, you might be accustomed to using that former home office as a bedroom, despite its lack of closet. And you might not notice any more that a door opens "backwards" or that some paint got on the light switch plate when you repainted a room. But potential buyers are much more likely to notice these things and get a negative impression of your home from them. Again, imagine you're seeing your home for the first time. Clean up any details like awkward paint, and restage rooms to help them look more like buyers would expect.

To get you started, here are a few resources: tips for painting your door and your kitchen cabinets. You can find more painting, cleaning and staging tips on my Pinterest board for "real estate help".

Moving Organization

Whether your move involves kids, pets, or only adults, it's important to have strategies for keeping your move organized and efficient. Here are some ideas for you to check out:

• Packing tips from About.com, including the importance of color-coding and keeping a list: http://interiordec.about.com/od/moving/a/org_movetips.htm
• MovingTips.org offers checklists, starting at one month out from your move: http://www.movingtips.org
• Some "big picture" tips from Realtor.com: things to think about in advance as well as detail tips like taking pictures of your electronics' cables before disconnecting. http://www.realtor.com/home-finance/real-estate/buyers/summer-moving-tips.aspx
• 33 simple but non-obvious moving tips on Buzzfeed: http://www.buzzfeed.com/peggy/brilliant-moving-tips
• A great packing material source: UsedCardboardBoxes.com offers quality previously-used boxes that save trees and save you money. http://www.usedcardboardboxes.com/index.php

Here's to the smoothest move possible!

Moving with Pets

May is National Moving Month, meaning that this month is the beginning of summer and moving season in the US. Many families will take advantage of the break in school and the relatively calm weather to move to new homes between now and Labor Day.

If your family is moving and you have pets, you may be thinking about what you'll need to do to make this a smooth transition for them. Here are some suggestions and resources:

• Realtor Mag has collected suggestions from The Pet Realty Network in Naples, FL, which include making sure your pet's ID tags are up to date, taking a copy of your vet records with you, and packing a basic pet first aid kit.
• For practical and logistical ideas, PetsWelcome has a variety of checklists. These include pre-move items, like veterinary care and state regulations; different transportation methods; and advice for moving small pets, birds, fish, horses, and others.
• Petfinder suggests some steps you can take before moving to help cats acclimate to carriers and dogs to cars and points out what you'll need to check motel rooms for, if you're driving for multiple days.

Between these sites, you'll be able to assemble a to-do list that suits the needs of you and your pet. Happy moving!

How-to: Home Painting Tips

A fresh coat of paint can make a big difference, whether it's for a whole room, a front door, or your kitchen cabinets. But painting well and efficiently requires that you know a few tricks. Thankfully, experienced painters have shared their tricks with us all, via the internet!

The Family Handyman has a page filled with tips from a veteran painter that tells you how to paint a room quickly, cleanly, and with professional style. The tips for getting clean edges without taping (and knowing when using tape is essential) are great, and all the advice combines big picture and details.

Painting your front door is another project that can really change your house's presentation, and Barbara at DIY Home Staging has a "Girl's Guide to Painting Your Front Door" that shows you how. What makes it a "girl's guide," you ask? Barbara writes, "you'll paint the door in place, so there's no need to pull hinge pins and lug the door somewhere to put on sawhorses. And like a real lady, you'll get beautiful results without making a mess." But you don't have to be a girl to benefit from these tips. Anyone can click over and start painting!

And of course sometimes you'll need to paint things like kitchen cabinets. Jenny at Evolution of Style has a detailed blog of her experience painting her kitchen cabinets with a HVLP (high-volume, low-pressure) sprayer. See how she got a professional look while doing it herself!

What are your favorite internet resources for painting projects?

Do-It-Yourself

The internet is a great place to find do-it-yourself (DIY) instructions for a variety of home maintenance tasks. While it's important to recognize when your best plan is to call for professional help, being resourceful and tackling things on your own can also be a good approach. Here are some links I've found for DIY maintenance and repairs:

• How to remove motor oil from a concrete driveway
• How to clean vinyl siding
• How to fix a leaky faucet
• How to maintain your home's windows

And on a different note, here's an idea for cleaning up your garage: turn an old file cabinet into a garage  organizer.

You can make some maintenance and organization part of your spring cleaning and keep your home in great shape for living in, or for selling!

House Cleaning Tips

Some more internet resources for keeping your house clean from top to bottom, whether for daily living or for putting it on the market:

• How to clean your ceiling fan
• Tub scrub by Martha Stewart
• House cleaning tips from a professional with hotel industry experience
• 33 meticulous cleaning tricks
• How to remove oil from your driveway

Internet Resources for Showings and Everyday

This post is a different type of "insider" knowledge, one that can be used when preparing to show your home as part of the selling process, or as part of your everyday life. Here are some of the how-to resources I've found online:

• How to use vinegar to clean up hard water stains
• Recipe for homemade no-scrub carpet stain remover
• List of 10 easy tasks for a cleaner house
• How to clean your glass cooktop with baking soda
• How to clean your top-loading washing machine (and how to clean your front-loading washing machine)
• A long list of all-natural cleaning solutions

I'll have more to share later!