Selling a home can be an extremely tiring and emotionally straining. Sometimes, when we choose to do it alone and without the aid of real estate agents, it can be very overwhelming. And in some cases, even when there’s a seasoned broker or agent in the picture, emotional and overexcited home seller makes mistakes that harm the selling process.

What are these very common mistakes that are easily avoidable but people make anyway? Here are some of them:

1 Putting out a less than ready home. Lots of garbage, lots of repairs to make, no place to move into, not even a fresh coat of paint anywhere. Doing this can make you lose the chance of selling your home at a better price. Preparing for home selling ideally should come about a year or half a year from your target selling date. Make the necessary repairs and preparations that could help make your home a generally more marketable place.

      Putting out too much renovations and improvements that do not equate to better value in marketing. Sometimes, homeowners do so much with so little value. Filling up a small bathroom with a huge Jacuzzi, or eating up the space of half of the house for a huge modern kitchen that is out of place in your rustic interiors would more likely shoo away your potential buyers than lure them into buying your place. Choose your home improvements wisely – home security, more space, etc.

        Expecting to sell at such a high price. Unless you are from a long line of politicians in a historic family, or living in a home that is in some artist’s popular painting, or anything close to that, your emotional and personal attachments to the house have no monetary equivalent. So don’t do exactly that. Hire a professional appraiser and have him/her assess the value of the house for you. Their assessment is unbiased and accurate.

Letting the realtor do all the work. If you’re (a) not Angelina Jolie, (b) not Bill Gates, (c) not anyone super famous, do some work at selling your home. Stage your house, make your house presentable when buyers come in, do the repairs and replacements, help out in marketing your house at the very least and help make things move faster.

Hiring just any agent. Hiring an agent is practically hiring someone to do for you a la employer-employee. You need to see their qualifications, ask them what you need to know about them (and maybe how they’d take on marketing the house). The good thing is, you don’t need to commit right away with agents. You can shop around – talk to as many of them as possible until you find someone who suits your needs. And should there be problems between you and your agent after you’ve signed things up, the best person to see and talk to about the dispute is the person in authority – the broker.

Avoid these costly mistakes and have a hassle-free home selling experience!