Quite a few of our sellers have spent $30,000 getting their houses ready for sale; some less, at least one, more. How much they spend depends of course on a number of factors including whether the seller has the money and the time available, what has been done to update and maintain the house before, and what the goals of the seller are.

Very generally speaking, the most interest and the highest prices are paid for houses that are located in popular areas, ones that are unoccupied but clean and attractive and in good working order.

Painting is undoubtedly the most often made improvement and the most dramatic. There is nothing that beats painting. What it costs can vary enormously depending on how much is done and who is hired to do it. Good color choices can make it or break it but so can the quality of the work.

Not long ago one of our sellers paid $10,500 to a painting company. We thought it was worth every penny. She had been in her house for 40 years but had not done any redecorating for most of that time. It took the crew 2 weeks to paint every surface inside of the house. Three bedrooms, 2 baths, including inside all of the closets and kitchen cupboards and the inside of the attached double garage. Plus some touch-up work was done on the exterior.

In that case the surfaces needed little beyond washing before they were painted. Most windows were unpainted metal and were left as they were.

At another house recently, exterior wood surfaces, siding, windows and trim had not been painted for many years. Paint was rippled and missing so considerable prep work was needed. Cost was $8,000.

Refinishing hardwood floors typically costs $3,000 to $4,000 depending on area worked, whether there are stairs included and if there are boards that need to be replaced. What a difference newly finished floors make. Clean, clear, shiny – well, not glossy. Matte finish looks polished but not glaring.

Most sellers these days hire a stager who may choose paint colors, may shop for light fixtures and window coverings. She or he will arrange furniture and other contents inside the house. Sometimes the stager will use some of the owner’s belongings but more often the seller has already moved and the stager brings in everything including plants and flowers.

Depending of course on the stager, the size of the house, length of time the house is on the market and what services and materials are provided, the stagers we use charge around $4,000.

Last year one of our sellers moved to a retirement home. Ultimately she spent $16,000 getting her Berkeley hills house ready to sell. Before we decided on that amount, we had inspections of the house to see what the house needed, and we thought and shopped and talked to our stager and our contractors.

The house was built new in 1952 and was basically in good shape. Roof, furnace, foundation, etc. were modern and fine but the house looked dated and tired.

The first thing we did was try to figure out who would be buying this house. It was not large. Two smallish bedrooms, 1 bath with a decent sized open area containing living, dining and kitchen. Below the house but without an inside entrance was finished space for laundry, storage, projects.

Although in the hills, it was not a big view house but there was plenty of space for gardening. The size, style, condition and location suggested a comparatively modest price for Berkeley. It seemed likely that a single person or a couple without children would be buying it, probably a first time buyer.

We didn’t see how it would make sense to change much. Replacing the awkward steps to the front door would be expensive and would not, we felt, add substantially to value. Replacing the original pink ceramic tile counters in the kitchen didn’t seem warranted either. They were still in good condition and looked right with the style of the house.

The clothes washer however was located in the kitchen, with the dryer in the lower level. Wet clothes had to be carried outside and around the corner, in the rain, and we thought having both appliances together would be a worthy improvement.

The interior could use fresh paint and one side of the exterior had for some reason been skipped the last time the house was painted. Curtains and light fixtures were old and spotted. The wood floors were foot worn in places but not stained or splintered.

We set the budget for renewal at $16,000 and here is what we got:

Walls in most rooms were painted (trim and doors and some ceilings remained unpainted wood) and so was the exterior back side of the house. Cost was $5500.

Huge quantities of scrap lumber, a ramshackle shed and worn out fencing, tree trimmings, etc. were hauled. Cost $1100.

Our contractor charged $2200 for doing many tasks including exterior lights for safety on the front stairs, relocating the washing machine and putting in its place a dishwasher with butcher block counter, hanging light fixtures, etc.

We decided to have the wood floors recoated rather than sanded and refinished, and in this case, that worked fine. Cost $625. Cleaning and window washing were $425.

Staging in this case cost $3500 which included some staging in the tidied up garden.

Miscellaneous light fixtures, doormats, curtains and rods, and so forth, plus an unexpected plumbing repair made up the balance.

Because we had a generous amount of time to work on this house and it was unoccupied, the costs were lower than they might have been. Our seller moved out in the fall, the house was emptied, hauling and garden clean-up done, and the other work scheduled before the holidays. We decided early on to wait until the new year, when the market first wakes up in January, to show the house.

It looked very good when we did. Tidy inside and out and quite appealing. We enjoyed being there, had lots of people come to see it, and it sold well (good price, buyer and seller both very happy) within a week.