August Edition: What to do with the listing that sat all summer
The Maley House Collective Newsletter
August Edition
What to do with the listing that sat all summer.
Hello, friends of the Collective,
August in West Michigan holds on with both hands. The light comes in lower and softer through the west windows than it did a month ago. The water is still warm. The evenings are getting shorter in a way you feel before you notice. And somewhere in the middle of the last cookout and the first school bus, the market quietly changes gears.
Summer buyers who did not find their house are still out there, and they are done browsing. Fall listings go up against less competition and meet a more serious room. So this month is about the turn, how to make a home feel ready for it, and why the weeks between Labor Day and Halloween are some of the best of the year to sell.
The Fall Market Starts Now
Here is what we see every year. The listings that come on in September and October are meeting buyers who have been looking since April. They know the inventory. They know what things cost. They have been outbid or disappointed at least once, and they are ready to move on a home that feels right the moment they walk in. That is a very different buyer than the one wandering through open houses in June.
The catch is that a house needs different things in the fall than it did in the summer. The yard has taken a beating. The shrubs have grown into the windows. Everything that looked bright and breezy in July can read a little tired by the end of August, and the lower light shows it. A home staged for fall leans warmer, not darker: heavier weaves, deeper wood tones, lamplight in the corners, a little more texture to catch the softer sun.
We are booking September and October now, and those weeks fill faster than people expect. If you have a home coming on this fall, or a lake rental you are thinking about listing once the season winds down, this is the month to get on the calendar.
FOR HOMEOWNERS
Turning a summer house into a fall listing
List into the quiet, not the crowd. Fewer homes come on after Labor Day, so yours gets a longer look from buyers who have already been searching all summer.
Give the outside an honest hour. Cut back the shrubs that grew over the windows, edge the beds, refresh the mulch, and wash the pollen off the glass. The lower fall light finds everything.
Trade fresh for dried. The hydrangeas have had their run. Dried grasses, eucalyptus, a wooden bowl of pears on the counter. Same warmth, and it holds up through weeks of showings.
Turn on the lamps at four o’clock. Evening showings arrive in the dark now. A house lit only from the ceiling feels like an office. Lamps in the corners make it feel like someone lives there happily.
Let us do the lifting. You hand us a key and we take it from there. We access the home, bring everything in, and style it room by room, so you can put your energy into the move instead of the boxes.
FOR REALTORS
Getting the fall listing right the first time
Get on the September calendar now. Fall staging books up in August. The listings that hit the market styled on day one are the ones that do not need a price adjustment in October.
Shoot while the yard still looks alive. Photograph before the leaves drop and the beds go brown. A green exterior shot carries a listing all the way into November.
Reset the listing that sat all summer. A stale listing is not a lost cause, it is usually a presentation problem. A home in Ada sat three months without an offer and went under contract ten days after we staged it.
Watch the lake rentals. From Saugatuck to South Haven to New Buffalo, owners decide to sell once the season winds down. A home styled for guests is not staged for buyers, and the difference shows in the photos.
Sell the season they are picturing. Fall buyers are imagining the first fire and where the table goes at Thanksgiving. Show them a home those things already fit in, and the offer comes faster.
NOW BOOKING | FALL PORCH STYLING
Here is a service people are always a little surprised we offer, so I want to make sure you know about it. We style porches for fall. Not the inflatable scarecrow version. The kind you pull into the driveway and feel glad about. Heirloom pumpkins in muted greens and creams and the pale gray ones, planters of ornamental grasses and cabbage, a fresh mat, a lantern that actually gets lit, and a wreath that looks like it belongs on your house instead of on a shelf at the store.
We bring everything, set it, and come back to take it down when the season is over, so you are not storing a bin of it in the garage until spring. For a listing it matters more than people think, because the porch is the first photo a buyer sees and the first ten seconds of every showing. For a home nobody is selling it matters for a simpler reason. You pull in every single day, and it is a good feeling to be glad about your own front door.
We style porches all over West Michigan and down the shoreline, and the calendar fills through October. If you want one done before the first cold snap, reach out soon. The good pumpkins go early.
Let's Work Together
Whether you are preparing a listing, getting a short-term rental ready to host guests, dreaming up your next project, or need a porch styled, we would love to hear from you. Reach out anytime to talk staging, availability, or to simply say hello.
With love from our home to yours, Jill The Maley House Collective
Visit our social accounts
Comments