Thinking back to buying your first home, it was so exciting and you had such big plans. You may not have had a lot of furniture or resources but you made your new house into your home. You painted the walls, decorated, and began filling the space with everything you own. You worked away on the perfect lawn and landscape. Many precious moments were created in your home and you made so many memories through hard work. But now, decades later, living in your home no longer works for you – there are too many stairs to climb every single day, more rooms than people, and maintaining the property is just too exhausting.
If you’re feeling this way, you may want to consider senior living. At Core Properties, we help people transition into senior living facilities all the time. We’re the exclusive real estate partner for Bethesda, a leading St. Louis senior living group of facilities. Our team understands how challenging the process can be and we’re here to help make your experience as smooth as possible. From home clean-up and multiple house sale options to estate sale set up and home-clean out services, we can help you every step of the way.
Here are our top 5 tips based on our experience working with people transitioning into senior living:
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Have an expert look at your house with you
Share with them known issues and concerns you have. Also discuss the amount of work you want to put into the house to sell your home or if you just want to get it sold quickly as-is. Every home is unique, but the thing we can share from our experience is today’s buyers can be finicky, so be prepared to hear about the latest trends and how you may have to make some updates.
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Analyze selling your home as-is for quick closing versus a traditional listing
Each home is different and your tolerance, budget and timing for updating may or may not work for your situation. At Core, we can quickly help you understand the budget it would take to have a traditional listing or if you should sell as-is. Ultimately the decision is yours but understanding options empowers you. Our team is equipped to help sellers in either situation.
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You will be bringing some things to your new home but you need to start thinking about downsizing
You have a couple options – one is to donate to a local nonprofit that can take everything in your house you haven’t passed on to others. This may create an opportunity for you to write off a donation of your stuff as a charitable contribution. Option two is to hire an auction company to help sell the things in your home that you no longer need. When Core handles a transition into senior living, we handle this step for our clients. But we can’t stress enough that every person’s situation is unique and we can walk you through your options to figure out what works best for you.
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Ask a trusted friend or family member to help you in this journey, there are many hard decisions and steps
Your trusted advisor can help you with the checklist of things that need to be done. The process of transitioning can be an emotional one and hard at time because you have many memories in your home. In the end you can’t bring everything into your new space and you have to unload a lot of treasured items. Instruct your friend or family member on how you want them to advise you in this situation at the very beginning.
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Write a letter to your neighbors, friends and family sharing your new journey
Saying goodbye is always tough. Writing a thank you letter or sending a note to announce your move may make the process a little easier. Also try and schedule a time for your friends, family and/or neighbors to visit you in your new home.
At Core Properties, we see these transitions every day of the week. While senior living is a big change, it’s a great way to live. And it’s our goal to help make the process as smooth as possible. We are also happy to give you a no obligation analysis of your situation and learn more about our Bethesda Moving with Ease services. If interested, contact us at (314) 356-9052.