Hello! We are selling our house in Colorado Springs, and it is a seller's market. I'm concerned about some of the damage in our house, and how it will effect our sale (we are working on the repairs we can make though). Our damage?
1- The flooring on the main floor needs to be replaced entirely. The carpet is gross (I think it might be okay with a deep cleaning?), and the engineered wood floors are damaged (beyond repair- I checked). Replacing flooring would be too expensive for us.
2 - horrible drywall repairs- you can see bumps and waves on the wall. This is after hiring a drywall guy to do initial repairs (and I've called, he is not answering me anymore. Found him on Craigslist, so really no recourse).
We have about $4k we can spend on moving/repairing. I expect to hire a handyman for all the little things I can't get to, house cleaners for the move out, painters for the rooms with (I think) beautiful dark and moody paint, and carpet cleaning (awesome friends are helping us move without renting a truck).
My questions- given the damage I know about, being a seller's market, and our budget for the move, is it worth hiring a home stager and professional photographer? I feel like home staging would give people something to see, besides focusing on needing to replace flooring. My other half thinks its a waste of money. We are planning on using a Redfin realtor, but he is not so good with optics (he didn't recommend any design changes; everything we've done is based on my vast knowledge acquired by watching HGTV. Also, I get the feeling his personality is more logic based (like Data in Next Gen Star Trek), so maybe that is why he doesn't think there needs to be any thought into the presentation of the house. I think people tend to be emotional about a house purchase (at least I was), and having non-personal decorations make the house feel like they could make it a home.
Additional information: We are in a new neighborhood (right across the street from a park), and all the houses are selling at $330k and up (this includes new builds; but they tend to $350k and up). I know we need to talk to a realtor, but I think we should get between $320k (given repairs) and $340k (wildly optimistic). The meteoric rise in house prices the last two years mean either price will net us a profit. I just want to maximize that! Thank you for any advice.
TL; DR- should I invest in a home stager and professional photographer for our home sale in a seller's market?