real estate agents in Chico Archives - The Jacobi Team, Century 21 Select Real Estate, Inc.

Getting Ready To Sell Part Two

Addressing the home’s interior

Last week we looked at the exterior, now for the interior

It’s exciting to think about selling your home but it can be a little overwhelming. Where to begin? In last week’s post we looked at 10 points to think about regarding the exterior of the home. Let’s turn that same thinking to the interior of your home. Again, your budget and the time you can spend will determine how much of these things you can do. Doing all of them will ensure that your home is a shining star once it hits the market. Doing most of them will ensure that your home is ready for buyers to come and look and fall in love with your home. Doing none of them means you have to adjust your price to include an “as is” or “fixer-upper” sale.

Here goes, 10 points to consider for the interior in getting ready to sell:

1. Get a storage unit or clear a space in your garage and start packing! It’s time to declutter and open up the space. Pack up all knick-knacks, personal photos, clutter, etc. Your goal is to have your bookshelves, closets and surfaces have barely anything on or in them. Kitchen and bathroom counters need to be completely bare except for hand soap. You want potential buyers to see the home and envision themselves living there.

2. Replace any burned out bulbs or faulty light switches. If a prospective buyer goes to turn on a light and it doesn’t turn on because of a burnt out bulb, they may think the worst and figure there’s something wrong with the electric system in your home. You might consider getting a whole house inspection done to find out all the little things that could be fixed. A buyer usually gets a whole house inspection but if you get to it first then they won’t have anything to request from you to fix during escrow.

3. Pet or smoke odors can lose you thousands of dollars off the sale of your home, so if you have a pet or you smoke, consider waiting to deep clean the home until a week before your home goes on the market and then the cleaning smells will be fresh for the rush of buyers when they come the first couple weeks.

4. Deep clean the entire house: windows, sills, blinds, curtains, carpet, cabinets, walls, baseboards, trim, ceiling fans, surfaces, tub and toilet stains, grout stains, etc. And remember the oven! Consider having your carpets professionally cleaned and have any sections that have stains or rips repaired. If your budget allows, hire professional cleaners to come in and do the deep cleaning.

5. No cobwebs anywhere. Especially just before open houses or showings, take a duster and go over everything.

6. Paint brightly colored walls a neutral color like beige, sand or off white. This will help prospective buyers to better imagine their own color schemes in the home.

7. Patch and paint any holes. This is a good task to do just prior to deep cleaning.

8. Repair leaky faucets, loose doorknobs, cabinets that don’t close all the way, etc.

9. Small updates that pack a big punch could include new, modern faucets in kitchen and bath; newer, modern ceiling fans and light fixtures; new throw pillows and area rugs and new towels for the bathroom.

10. If your home is in the City of Chico and was built prior to 1991 and you bought it more than 10 years ago then you will need to ensure that you have R30 ceiling insulation in order to sell your home. The buyer can take responsibility for that but that is something that the typical buyer will expect a seller to do. So if you do it ahead of time then you will be better off. This is something you can discuss with your real estate agent.

There are many ins and outs to getting a home ready to put on the market. Emmett and Kim Jacobi – The Jacobi Team – are experts in navigating the intricacies of selling a home and also of buying a home. Contact them today to start a conversation.

Getting Ready To Sell

First Let’s Look Outside

We’ll look at the interior in next week’s post.

Getting ready to sell your home? Here are 10 points to think about. Your budget and time will help you to prioritize the list and help you to make decisions on which items can actually be done. Doing all of them will ensure that your home is a shining star once it hits the market. Doing most of them will ensure that your home is ready for buyers to come and look and fall in love with your home. Doing none? Well that means you may need to adjust your price to make it an “as is” or “fixer-upper” sale.

Okay, here we go, a 10 point to-do list for the exterior:

1. Landscaping: pull weeds, trim bushes and trees and mow the lawn. For a finished look to the flower beds add fresh bark and a pop of color with some annuals planted near the front door.

2. Power wash the exterior and touch up areas of peeling paint. If you can afford it, paint the whole exterior if your home hasn’t been painted in over 10 years. Make sure all cobwebs are removed from the exterior at the very least. Shake out the welcome mat and dust down the front door.

3. Clean all the windows and replace any broken or missing screens. If you have windows that are cracked – or missing – have them replaced if you can. The windows are the eyes of the home and you want yours shining brightly.

4. Get a roof inspection if your roof is over 15 years old. Get any repairs done that will ensure that a buyer can get a loan on the home.

5. Get a pest inspection done and have all dry rot and wood destroying pest issues addressed. This will ensure that a buyer can get a loan on your home as well.

6. If you have a septic system and are not connected to city sewer, ensure that your septic tank is pumped and inspected. If the inspection shows major problems with the septic and you do not have the money to fix it, ask your real estate agent about a “buyers a credit” to go towards septic repair.

7. Replace any missing or broken bricks, pavers, shingles or stones anywhere on the exterior or walkways. Now is a good time to look at the driveway – is it cracked? Buckled? If you can afford to, give your driveway some loving attention as it will increase the curb appeal of the home.

8. If you have a chimney make sure there is a properly installed chimney cap. The roofer can do that when he goes up to do his inspection. There are many points to be considered about chimneys, here’s an interesting article.

9. If your heating and air system is older than 15 years consider having it serviced and inspected. You might consider have the home’s ducts checked, cleaned and repaired if needed.

10. Does your property have fencing? If so, take a walk around and check for possible wear or damage. Maybe all that is needed are a few new boards here or there. Or, if you can afford it, you may need a whole new fence. Broken down fences can be a negative to a buyer, whereas a newly painted, repaired fence can make the property look loved and cared for and increases its value.

There is much to consider when thinking about getting a home ready for sale. Emmett and Kim Jacobi, The Jacobi Team, are experts at helping people navigate the ins and outs of home selling. Contact them today.

The Invisible Door

What’s bigger than the front door?

Answer: the Garage Door!

Most homes have driveways – or in some cases roadways – that lead to the garage. Some houses, of course, may not have a garage, they could have carports or nothing at all to protect the vehicles. But the majority have garages – and nearly all garages have doors.

The typical neighborhood home faces the street, with a driveway that connects the street to the garage. Unless the homeowner uses the garage for storage or as an extra occupied room, garages are used to shelter the family vehicles. And no matter what the garage space is actually used for, it still has a door that faces the street.

What’s interesting is that some garage doors are totally forgotten about in the preparation for selling a home. Which is a shame because garage doors can visually be nearly a third of the curb appeal. Also a garage door upgrade can add to the overall value of the home.

Let’s imagine that everything has been done in preparation for selling your home. The interior is sparkling clean and has been staged, ready for its first showing. The outside landscaping has been spruced up, the windows are all clean and sparkling and even the front door has been painted and fitted with new hardware.

Now walk out to the sidewalk and look at the front of the house as if you are a prospective buyer. What do you see? Is your home’s curb appeal appealing? Has anything been forgotten? Now take a look at the garage door.

* Does it need painting? Does it complement the design of your home’s overall architecture?
* Does it sag in its frame? Will it open all the way?
* Does it have an automatic opener? Does it work? Is it noisy when it opens?

To make your garage door fit the personality of your home and improve its salability consider bringing that garage door up to the standards of the rest of the home. Paint, repair or even consider replacing it. Buyers will notice it as soon as they pull up at the curb. And, if the garage door is meant to be opened and closed, they will want to see it in action during the home tour.

As with all other aspects of the home, let your garage door be one of the shining selling points. Read here an article showing some before and after examples of renovated garage doors.

The Jacobi Team can help you with all aspects of selling your home, from questions about staging the interior to tips about upgrading the exterior to improve the curb appeal. Contact The Jacobi Team today.

Taking on a fixer upper?

The real deal on TV home-remodeling shows

By Stephanie Brick, posted on the Washington Post website Click here to see original post
Oct. 22, 2018 at 5:00 a.m. PDT

It is no surprise that reality television is rarely a representation of reality. How genuinely can anyone act (no pun intended) with a crew of cameras and microphones within arm’s reach? From scripted dialogue to behind-the-scenes staging, reality TV has seeped into nearly every corner of the market, and home remodeling is no exception.

Through the evolution of television, facts and fiction have generally known their respective places and, even if commingled, remained distinct from each other. Historically, there has been a differentiating line between programming intended for entertainment and programming intended for information.

Blurred lines

The difficulty is that the television industry has increasingly blurred the line between shows designed for entertainment and shows designed for education. Channels such as TLC (which once stood for “The Learning Channel”), HGTV, and even the Weather Channel and various news syndicates used to be defined by either their informative or educational programs. Now, however, they are more entertainment than information channels: You are more likely to tune in to facts or reality — when it is even presented — encased by opinions, drama, heavy editing or outright inaccurate data.

How we process information changes when that entertainment/education line is blurred — specifically, when programs designed for entertainment start introducing elements of their show as factual (or vice versa). It is a sneaky way to tip the scales: The entire show is easy to register as entertainment. So when little “facts” or context-specific truths work their way in, we have our guard down and accept them, often without even thinking about it. At times, almost insidiously, these programs start to rebalance themselves in our minds as mildly educational. This is the danger zone of misinformation.

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As a design professional, I believe one of my responsibilities is to help educate my clients. Despite living in the information age, we are surrounded by misinformation — and it can be nearly impossible to differentiate between the two without proper guidance. I see the source of this problem regularly when I tune in to shows about remodeling. So how can you tell what is true to the screen and what may be — directly or indirectly — propagating misinformation?

When it comes to home-remodeling reality TV, context is everything.

First consider the context of the home: Where is it located?

In some renovation shows, the city, state or even country (a surprising number that air in the United States are produced in Canada) are omitted. This becomes a honey pot for misinformation when numbers are then, inevitably, discussed.

Pricing for materials, labor and overall project budgets are not consistent across the United States, and any dollar amount needs context to have value. A $50,000 budget will yield wildly different results for a project in the heart of an East Coast city than it will in a Midwestern suburb. Always think to question where a project is located if numbers are discussed on a remodeling show.

It should also be noted that budget and total project costs may be influenced by the channel paying its regular and/or guest cast members each episode. (Do you think the designers, contractors and homeowners are only receiving 15 minutes of fame as compensation?)

Next, consider the episode in the context of its series.

Does it follow a formula? Confident designer makes lofty promises on seemingly low budget; problems are discovered during demolition; lofty scope must be dramatically reduced “to resolve discovered problem” or an egregious budget increase is required . . . every time.

To their credit, many of these shows do an excellent job communicating this true reality: Once construction has started, sometimes hidden or unknown existing conditions are revealed that warrant (or require) an unexpected increase in scope — which results in an increase in cost.

For instance, disintegrating pipelines or tangled DIY electrical work behind drywall usually cannot be detected — or accounted for — ahead of time. (As I tell my clients, we are still working on X-ray vision technology.)

However, this does not happen with every single household or project. So if you notice it happening — on a dramatic scale — during every episode of a reality TV show, recognize this consistently injected drama for what it is: a real representation of renovation risks? Perhaps. An excuse to get out of building that third-story addition that was never even close to realistic for the proposed, yet accepted, budget? Definitely.

Third, what is the context of the final results you are seeing?

Extravagant scopes on extremely short timelines are simply unrealistic. In theory, you could hire a huge workforce — but have you ever tried to find more than one really good craftsman or contractor to work on your home? How about a hundred? Even with the best of laborers, tight timelines rarely set anyone up for quality success.

In recent years, the grand unveiling of these finished houses have been quietly revealed as — sometimes — just grand shams, showcasing a meticulously composed staging. What you see is a beautiful, furnished, finished space, but just beyond the camera’s precisely calculated pan is an unfinished room and incomplete home.

Not knowing a project’s geographic context can lead to a misperception of budget and costs. Having only the pinhole sightline of a camera’s view can lead to unrealistic timeline expectations — even if just as an indirect, trickle-down effect.

We all know building a custom home from scratch in a week is unrealistic under normal circumstances. But does it not still, despite this acknowledgment, make three weeks for a bathroom remodel seem a little longer than it should be?

Whether or not your project is filmed by a crew and broadcast to the world, all architecture projects are governed by three factors: time, money and quality. If you are lucky, pick any two — speedy schedule, low cost, genuine craftsmanship — at the sacrifice of the third.

Many home-remodeling TV shows seem to deliver all three. These may be excellent sources for entertainment but should be recognized as poor sources of information.

Stephanie Brick is the owner of Stephanie Brick Design in Baltimore.

A Note from the Jacobi Team’s Kim Jacobi: Hey! We hope you stick around on our website and check it out! You can search for homes, sign up for our newsletter, and more!

You Must Master This When House Hunting

Excerpt from: Take Note! This Is the One Thing You Must Master When House Hunting

By Jamie Wiebe | Sep 27, 2018 From the Realtor.com website

Average home buyers look at 10 houses before they find The One. And unless you’ve lucked out with a photographic memory, remembering the details of all those homes can prove challenging. Wait, which one had that weird bathroom? What was the address of that awesome house near the lakeshore?

If only you’d written it down.

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It might not be the most exciting skill to learn, but good note-taking can keep you organized and dramatically simplify your home search. Yes, you already know how to write things down. But are you writing down the right things?

Jot down your impressions of size

You might be wowed by the size of the place when you walk inside, but you’re omitting crucial information if you’re not comparing that impression with the actual dimensions. Most homes come with a spec sheet, and if you’re surprised to discover the cavernous living room is just 9 feet by 9 feet—smaller than your bedroom at home—then make a note. Clever staging might be tricking your eyes, and getting the space to feel that enormous with your own furniture might be a challenge.

“Looks can be deceiving, and many agents have the means to perfectly stage a property,” says Vincent Averaimo, who works in real estate law. “Sometimes that means it looks bigger than it really is.”

Record your gut feeling

When you step into the home, what do you feel? After a long day spent driving to a dozen different homes, you’re likely to forget that feeling.

So make sure to write it down. Did you feel relaxed and comfortable? Slightly ill at ease? Did an intangible thrill race along your spine?

“When you have found the home for you, there’s a special feeling that you get,” Roberson says.

While you’re at it, dig into the specifics of why you got that special “yes!” feeling. Was it the bay window in the master bedroom? The 500-bottle wine cellar you’re already dreaming of filling up?

“Note something you really love about the home or something that really bugs you,” says Maria Daou, a real estate broker in New York City. “If you don’t make these notes in the moment, when you are in the space, you forget what it is and all the houses start blending together.”

Give the home a numerical rating

Real estate agent Dale Schaechterle recommends establishing three “have to haves,” which must be included in your final home. Then, each time you visit a house, rate each of these must-haves from 1 to 10, with 10 being “exceptional” or even “better than desired.”

For instance, if you’re insistent on a three-bedroom home, then a home with more than three beds might get a 10, and a three-bedroom home gets an 8.

At the end, tally it all up to see which home has the highest score on the things that matter most to you.

“A perfect score is not the goal,” Schaechterle says. You’re looking for something with the best balance of everything you want that gives you “permission” to stop looking and write an offer.

Take pictures—of everything

Any good seller’s agent will stuff the listing chock-full of pictures—but that doesn’t mean you should put your camera away during the showing.

In fact, you should take photos of anything that jumps out at you—good or bad, recommends real estate broker Brenda Di Bari.

Did you absolutely adore the dual-faucet sink in the kitchen? Or were you uncertain about the strange laundry room setup? Flipping through your camera roll can help you recall the details that might not be pictured in the listing photos.

And there’s another darn good reason to take lots of pictures: Sometimes listing photos lie. A deck might look pristine on camera, but up close the boards are splitting and—oh, heavens—are those carpenter ants? Or perhaps a room that looked enormous feels more like a coffin in real life.

“Maybe there are areas of damage or concern that you want to consider before making an offer,” Di Bari says. A photo will help you remember.

Write down the renovations you’ll want (and look up their cost later)

Few houses are perfect. Jot down any obvious changes you’ll want to make—and anything that might impede a home improvement project. (Is that wall clearly structural?)

“Noting if [renovation] is even an option is really important,” Daou says.

Once you’ve figured out which renovations your potential home might need, suss out how much they’ll cost. Add that to any other must-change items, like a coat of paint, replacement gutters, or even furniture needed to outfit a bigger home.

“It almost always costs more than you think,” Di Bari says.

And what good is a dream home if you can’t afford to make it shine?

Note from the Jacobi Team

We hope you stick around and explore our website! On our site you can search for homes for sale in Chico and the surrounding area. You can also download our free Home Buyer’s Guide which is chock FULL of great info! Reach out to us if you have any questions! Thanks -Kim and Emmett

7 Small Tasks for January Decluttering and Organizing

If decluttering and organizing is on your New Year’s resolutions list, you might start visualizing your goal by saving photos of your favorite organized spaces to a Houzz ideabook. But at some point, you’ve got to go from dreaming to taking action. As a professional organizer, I recommend that you begin with tasks that take only an hour or two to complete.

Tackling smaller areas of your home can give you a sense of accomplishment that motivates you to continue organizing. Here are seven often-neglected areas that can be great places to start. Depending on the time you have, you may be able to get through several of these tasks this month.

1. Organize the Linen Closet

Linen closets can easily become disorganized, cluttered and overstuffed. Sometimes it may even become hard to close the door. The new year is a great time for a fresh start in this area.

Towels

Towels should be washed once or twice a week to maintain freshness and eliminate bacteria. I suggest keeping two to three bath towels per household member so you have a backup on wash day. If you have more towels than you truly need, consider getting rid of any that are faded, stained or frayed. A local animal shelter will probably be happy to receive them.

Sheets

Two sets of sheets per bed should generally be sufficient. If you use a duvet cover without a top sheet, there’s no reason to hang on to unused top sheets. Donate those that are in good shape.

Blankets

I recommend not letting the linen closet become a catchall for blankets you never use. Small fleece blankets commonly given as promotional items might be stashed and never looked at again. Consider parting with these and any other unused quilts, throws or comforters.

Once you’ve pared down your supply, I suggest labeling shelves to identify which linens belong where. You might use categories such as “master bedroom sheets,” “twin bed sheets” and “guest room sheets.” Alternatively, if your budget allows, you might consider purchasing containers to store bed and bath linens. Label your containers and store sets together: A queen-size top sheet, fitted sheet and matching pillowcases should go in the same bin to make it easy to find the whole set.

2. Clean Out the Coat Closet

A coat closet is valuable real estate that not everyone has the good fortune to possess. However, it can become a disorganized mess if not attended to periodically. Now might be a good time for a quick purging and organizing session.

When working with clients, I recommend they pull everything out of the closet and place coats, jackets and accessories on a clean table or other work surface. My clients are often surprised by how much a small space can hold!

Outerwear

Since this category of clothing tends not to be sentimental, it’s often easy to donate items you no longer use. If you happen to be saving outgrown jackets for a younger sibling, consider storing them away from this prime spot. Likewise, consider storing seasonal items like ski jackets with ski equipment.
You might find jackets and coats that were mistakenly left at your home after a party. In the future, return them in a timely fashion so they won’t continue to crowd your coat closet.

Accessories

Gloves, hats and scarves can usually be sorted quickly. Donate those you no longer use. Toss old gloves or mittens that are missing their mate. It might make sense to store rarely worn sentimental clothing such as logo hats and scarves — perhaps from your college, vacation or favorite sports team — in another part of the house.

Shoes

These have a way of piling up. Toss overly worn shoes and those without a mate. Consider donating outgrown children’s shoes that are still in good shape. It might be best to store athletic shoes and cleats in the garage or other storage area so they don’t give your closet an unpleasant odor. I recommend storing special-occasion shoes on the top shelf of your bedroom closet.

Random items

Now is the time to return random items stashed in the coat closet to their proper homes. Before entertaining, some of my clients throw clutter from counters and tabletops into boxes that they stash in the back of the coat closet. If you have such boxes, commit to sorting through them. You may discover a lost treasure buried there.

When returning coats and jackets to the closet, you might organize them by category (all raincoats together, for instance). Another option is to group coats and jackets according to their owner. You might want to invest in an over-the-door organizer to hold accessories. These can be great for storing gloves, hats and scarves.

Also consider giving yourself a deadline to get any donations out of the house so they don’t end up back in the closet.

3. Declutter Under the Kitchen Sink

Since the area under the kitchen sink is small, it can usually be transformed in less than an hour. Start by pulling out all the contents and placing it on a counter or table. Then wipe the interior of the cabinet clean with warm, soapy water.

Next address your undersink products. Consider consolidating duplicates. For example, two half-used containers of dishwasher pods might be consolidated into one. (Take care not to mix products, as cleaning agents containing ammonia and bleach create toxic fumes if combined.)

Toss any products that have dried out or are no longer needed. People sometimes collect free samples of dishwasher soap or other cleaning products and then never use them. Consider getting rid of such samples or at least using them in the coming weeks so you don’t end up storing them indefinitely.

Wipe off remaining products with warm, soapy water. I suggest corralling supplies in plastic storage caddies to help the space under the sink stay neat. If you don’t want to purchase new caddies, you may be able to repurpose containers you already own.

Group similar products: dishwashing products in a single container, cleaning supplies in another. If you need more storage, you might consider purchasing an organizer that attaches to the cabinet door.

4. Purge the Freezer

Many people clean out their refrigerator on a regular basis yet don’t address the freezer.

Begin by removing all of the contents. Wipe down the freezer with warm, soapy water.

Consider tossing foods that have been in the freezer for many months. It’s safe to freeze food indefinitely at 0° F but, according to the FDA, the food’s quality decreases the longer it’s frozen. Tenderness, flavor, aroma, juiciness and color can all be affected. The quality of ground beef declines in three to four months, for example, while chicken pieces will last for nine months, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The quality of soups and stews starts to degrade in two to three months.

If you don’t want to throw food away, you might instead eat it now before the quality deteriorates further. Also pitch foods that haven’t been properly wrapped and have freezer burn or are covered in ice crystals.

5. Clean Out the Kitchen Junk Drawer

Often my clients have one or more junk drawers in the kitchen. These might contain pens, receipts, hair ties, screwdrivers, flashlights, power cords, earbuds, lip balm, old sunglasses, packing tape, old cell phones and a multitude of other random items. It’s often difficult to find anything in them because they’re so messy.

I suggest limiting your kitchen junk to just one drawer, and try to limit its contents to things you use every day.

To organize this area, I recommend first removing everything from the drawer. Toss anything broken or unusable, such as dried-out pens. Toss or file old receipts. Consider donating unused items that still have life in them, such as old sunglasses. Remove the SIM cards from old cellphones and recycle the phones at a local electronic-waste-disposal site.

Then return the items you want to keep — but not in the junk drawer — to their proper homes: tools to the toolbox, hair ties to the bathroom drawer.

For the items that will remain in the junk drawer, consider purchasing organizers or repurposing small containers to keep the drawer from becoming chaotic. Use these containers to store everyday items such as earbuds, phone chargers, pens, tape and scissors.

Since a junk drawer has the tendency to become a dumping ground, spend a few minutes each month removing things that don’t belong there and returning them to their proper homes.

6. Refold the Contents of your Sock and Underwear Drawer

Underwear and sock drawers can easily become a tangled web. The trick to corralling socks and lingerie is to break a large drawer into smaller sections and group similar items within each.

I recommend purchasing inexpensive drawer organizers. Collapsable cloth boxes or plastic containers are a good choice, or you can repurpose shoe or photo boxes. Spring-loaded plastic drawer dividers are another option.

To begin the organizing process, I recommend removing the contents of the drawer. Toss socks without a mate as well as anything else that has reached the end of its functional life.

I have a large drawer, so I divided it into five sections: bras, underwear, athletic socks, dress socks and tights. The boxes I purchased happen to fit perfectly in my drawer. If you can’t find a good fit for yours, consider spring-loaded dividers, which can be adjusted to fit most drawers.

You can fold bras and arrange them vertically within one box so that you can easily find the one you want. I recommend folding underwear neatly in another box and tights in a third. For socks, organizer Marie Kondo recommends folding them and storing vertically. If this doesn’t work for you, opt for the old-fashioned method of rolling each pair in a ball. Consider storing athletic socks in a separate container from dress socks.

I’ve found that my underwear and sock drawer has stayed neat and organized since I purchased drawer organizers. It’s easy to maintain and I don’t have to spend time each month tidying it.

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7. Organize Your Bathroom Drawer

Like any drawer that holds small items, the bathroom drawer can quickly become a jumbled mess without the use of drawer organizers. Fortunately, these are available in many shapes and sizes. Some people like individual clear plastic containers that fit products such as toothpaste, dental floss and razors.

I recommend that you measure your bathroom drawer before you purchase to ensure the correct fit. If you buy different sizes, they fit like a puzzle in the drawer, so be careful when measuring. It may be more economical to purchase one large organizer that’s divided into sections.

For this room, I do recommend purchasing organizers rather than repurposing existing containers. Bathroom drawers are shallow, and organizers also need to be able to stand up to moisture, so if you intend to repurpose containers, keep this in mind.

As with the previous tasks, begin by emptying and wiping out the drawer. Toss anything that’s dried out or unusable. Make room in your organizers for daily items like toothpaste, floss, razors, moisturizer and sunscreen. Create a space for cosmetics you use often. If you own a lot of makeup, you may want to store the less frequently used items in a container under the sink.

Once you’ve completed these seven tasks, give yourself a small reward. If you’re motivated to continue decluttering your home, you might even consider seven slightly larger tasks to focus on next month.

Written by Jeanne Taylor, found on the Houzz.com website

Hi from Emmett and Kim! We are a husband and wife real estate team here in Chico, CA with Century 21 Select Real Estate. We hope you stick around and check out our website! You can search for homes for sale in Chico or towns around it. You can get answers to your questions about buying a home or selling a home. You can even sign up to have an online consultation with Kim or Emmett about buying a house! Call us if you just want to talk real estate.