When a buyer enters a home for sale they immediately react positively or negatively based upon their senses. Our senses hearing, sight, touch, smell, and taste – are so strongly bound to our perceptions, emotions, and nostalgia, it’s no wonder that we rely on all five when looking for your perfect home.
Anyone who knows me knows I have a particular super power.- I literally smell everything which is both a burden and a gift rolled into one. Which leads me into smells and how they can affect perspective buyers when viewing your home.Smells and scents can make the difference. See my thoughts below for some musings on scents and smells when listing your home.
Perhaps the smell of fresh baked cookies takes you back to the kitchen in your childhood home. Vanilla and fresh scents (think mountain air or clean laundry smell) are the most popular and appealing fragrances when staging a home. In fact, vanilla is such a powerful scent, studies have shown it’s linked to positive nostalgic memories, reducing stress and anxiety and producing a sense of calm. You really want to eliminate pet smells, mildew and mold smells. They are the enemy. Mold smell in particular is the surest deal killer so remediation is a must before showing your home.
I strongly suggest avoiding plug in type scents as they can trigger headaches in some people, and in general can be off putting as well. A better idea is softly layering some clean burning scented candles and periodically open windows to air out your house even in winter.So yes all our senses are very important as we enter a home we are considering purchasing, but that subtle, sneaky sense of smell may quietly be a deal killer.
