The Los Angeles County Home Seller's Guide

Work backward from the week you want to be on the market.

Weeks 12 to 10: find out what you are working with.

• Get a real valuation, so every decision after this has a number behind it.
• Request your mortgage payoff, including any second loan or HELOC. People are routinely off by tens of thousands on this.
• Walk your own house honestly with us and note anything a buyer will find, so it is priced in rather than discovered later.
• If you have an HOA, do not order the document package yet. Before we list, we call the HOA ourselves to find out about any sign rules or selling restrictions, whether the community is FHA and VA approved, any rules a buyer needs to know, the amenities, the dues, and any assessments coming up. The paid document package gets ordered the day escrow opens, because it costs $500 to $1,000 and has a shelf life. It usually takes 10 days to 2 weeks to arrive, so ordering it on day one gets it to the buyer right before contingency removal. Order it months ahead and it can expire before you even have an offer.
• Ask your CPA whether you will owe anything on the sale, given the primary residence exclusion.

Weeks 10 to 6: the work that takes time.

• Anything you already know about the home that you have decided to fix.
• Exterior paint or touch-up, and the front door specifically.
• Landscaping. Plants need weeks to look like they belong there. This is why it goes early.
• Declutter one room at a time. Aim to remove a third of what is in each room, starting with closets, because buyers open every closet.
• Book a donation pickup and a junk haul. Putting a date on the calendar is what makes this happen.

Weeks 6 to 3: the finish work.

• Interior paint where it is needed. Neutral, and the same neutral throughout.
• Replace dated light fixtures and cabinet hardware. Cheap, fast, and buyers read them as how well the house was kept.
• Deep clean, including windows, inside and out. Clean windows change every photo.
• Fix the small broken things. The sticky drawer, the running toilet, the closet door off its track. Individually trivial; collectively they make a buyer wonder what else was ignored.
• Sort out the pets. Where they go for showings, and what happens to the smell you cannot smell anymore.

Weeks 3 to 1: ready to launch.

• Staging or restaging, even if it is only removing furniture.
• Photography, video, aerial, 3D tour, floor plan. All of it on one day, in the right light.
• Sign your disclosure package. We go through it line by line together.
• Decide your showing rules: hours, notice, lockbox, and what happens with the dog.
• Confirm smoke alarms, carbon monoxide detectors, and water heater strapping. California requires all three at transfer.

Almost every late-escrow scramble we have ever watched came from a document nobody went looking for until somebody needed it in two days. Solar paperwork is the worst offender, because it is not in a drawer in your house and it takes weeks to arrive from somebody else. So gather this while nothing is urgent. An afternoon now is worth a week later, and you will need most of it anyway.

• Mortgage statements and payoff amounts for every loan against the property.
• Your most recent property tax bill, including any Mello-Roos or special assessment line.
• Homeowners insurance policy and your claims history for the last five years.
• Permits and final sign-offs for any work done: additions, remodels, a re-roof, solar, a pool, a water heater, HVAC.
• Warranties and manuals for anything that stays: appliances, roof, HVAC, water heater, solar.
• Receipts and dates for major improvements. These support your price and may matter to your CPA.
• Solar paperwork, and critically whether it is owned, financed, or leased. A leased system has to be handled deliberately and can slow a deal down badly if it surfaces late.
• Your HOA's contact information and your latest dues statement. We handle the HOA questions before we list, and the full document package is ordered once you are in escrow.
• Septic or well records, if you are on either.
• Any prior inspection reports you have.
• For a trust or probate sale: the trust certification or the Letters from the court, showing the authority granted.

Pricing high to test the market. Your first ten days are when every buyer looking for a home like yours sees it. Spending those days at the wrong price spends the only asset you cannot get back. And a price reduction later tells buyers something is wrong, which is why reduced homes often sell for less than they would have if priced correctly on day one.

Weak photography. The showings you lose to bad photos never happen, so you never find out about them. There is no feedback loop on this one, which is exactly why people underrate it.

Over-improving. A remodel done to sell rarely returns what it cost and it delays you by months. Paint, landscaping, decluttering, and cleaning return far more per dollar.

Hiding a known problem. California requires you to disclose what you know about the condition of your home, and the buyer will find it during inspections anyway, except then it costs you leverage and credibility at once. Disclosed and priced in is a footnote. Discovered is a renegotiation.

Being unreachable during escrow. Deadlines in a California purchase agreement are real and they arrive fast. A seller who takes three days to answer turns a routine question into a problem.