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This is the first post in a four blog series. Find pointers 1-5 in this blog. For more tips & ideas, visit Part 2, Part 3 & Part 4.

In the previous blog, we discussed cheap and efficient quick fixes under $250 that can make your house look stellar. It’s now time to add finishing touches. Here are some great ideas that can be extremely effective if put together smartly!

OUTDOORS

The exterior of your house is what will draw people to check what’s inside. Here’s a list of tips to help make your house more inviting:

1. Driveway: Pay extra attention to the area that leads to your house. If it’s exceptionally dull, you could add some sparkle by getting the concrete driveway and sidewalk pressure washed. If you’ve an asphalt driveway, don’t forget to put a fresh coat of sealer.

2. Garage: A well organized, spacious garage could add more value to your house. Empty out whatever you don’t intend to use or keep. Double check to see that garage doors work smoothly. And ALWAYS keep garage doors down, especially when people come to see the house.

3. Mailbox: Is it way too fancy to drive people away? Does it look tacky? Keep it simple, straight and upright.

4. Lawn: Maintain your exterior regularly. Pull out weeds, trim bushes and mow the lawn as needed. If you have overgrown trees that cover your house completely,  consider pruning or removing them completely.

5. Landscape: Nothing adds life to an exterior like a well designed landscape. For that added touch of color and vibrancy, consider growing different colored flowers in adjacent beds.

Are you looking for professional help to sell your house fast? Express Homebuyers can help. In the past five years we’ve sold over 800 homes within the DC metro area. We can help you list your house for sale. If we can’t sell your house in 60 days, we guarantee to buy it from you, no matter what the condition.

Just call us at 877-804-5252 or visit our website to chat with a representative.

This series will be continued. For more tips to sell your house fast, continue to read our blogs.

If you have any tips or suggestions that you’d like to share, please feel free to comment on this blog post.

Eversince President Obama announced the Making Home Affordable Program (HAMP) to attack the housing crisis head on, there have been many modifications to the program attempting to address the problem. Though more successful than what the previous administration was able to do, the program started out with the intent of helping only a fraction of the distressed. Subsequent revisions have sought to expand HAMP’s reach, but critics and subsequent evidence have proven HAMP to be too little, too late.

Under the latest change to the program, banks must offer 3-6 months payment relief to the unemployed. Banks are encouraged (but not required) to cut principle payments, which will be compensated by $75 billion in diverted HAMP funds.

The new guidelines are an attempt to address two major causes of foreclosure: unemployment and negative equity. The crisis started among subprime mortgages that reset but spread to other groups – especially those who lost their jobs or saw their housing values dive. When HAMP was hatched last year, it immediately met criticism because it did not adequately address either problem.

In the original program, HAMP did not demand that principal balances on loans be reduced – even though evidence available at the time showed that this was the most effective way to approach the problem, especially in view of the growing negative equity problem.  Now banks will be offered incentives to reduce principle, but it is still not mandatory that they do so.

The crisis is far from over. Over the next two years, 8 million more foreclosures are anticipated.  Pay-option mortgages will reset, making house payments so large homeowners cannot keep up. Many underwater homeowners finally give up, out of necessity or strategic decision. The current reinvention of HAMP is only expected to help a few hundred thousand people, a couple drops of water in a predicted tsunami of foreclosures.

Feel underwater?  Fearing foreclosure?  Express Homebuyers buys homes for cash in DC, Maryland, and Virginia.