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Dealing with Furnishings as a Seller

About 70 percent of properties in Breckenridge and Summit County are second homes with owners who live far away. If this is your situation, you may not want to deal with selling furniture separately from the home itself, nor with moving or storing it. Our team of professional real estate brokers has compiled some tips for sellers of homes with furnishings.

Tips for Sellers

If you are the seller of a property and are including “Furniture and Furnishings” in the purchase price, it cannot be emphasized enough that you need to be precise in establishing what is staying in the home and what you are keeping after the sale. It may appear obvious to you that your personal items will not be included, but how is a buyer to know that the expensive Breckenridge painting your parents gave you for your birthday (that the buyers have just fallen in love with) is a personal item? If there are items that you do not want a buyer to assume are part of the purchase price, then it would be best to remove them prior to showings.

However, properties definitely show their best when they are fully furnished and decorated. Therefore, if you do decide to leave all items on display, then it is important to make sure that there is an Exclusions List identifying items not included in the purchase price. This list will be included in the MLS and will help to avoid any confusion over what furnishings are part of the deal.

Considerations of Buyers

Generally buyers experience one of two emotions in regard to Furniture and Furnishings: they are either delighted to learn that the furniture is included in the purchase price or the question arises, “Can we buy the house without the 20 year old furniture?”

Consult with your Breckenridge Associates Real Estate broker about the best way to handle the situation where buyers are not in love with the furnishings and may not want them to be part of the deal. Furniture is left more as a convenience than a significant added value in most cases. On another note, if the buyer is considering entering the property into the rental pool of properties in the area, having the property already furnished means it’s ready to rent sooner.