Home Staging Ideas: 10 Ways to Protect Your Privacy When Marketing Your Home
10 Ways to Protect Your Privacy When Marketing Your Home
Your home is on the market, and your home is now open to untold numbers of strangers. How private can that be?
You have managed to clean, declutter and depersonalize, but have you ‘privatized’ your home? Perhaps you know and trust everyone in your community, and feel that you have nothing to hide. Think again!
Leaving personal information for others to see may have significant consequences for you. First, while most people are kind and decent, and will respect your belongings, others will not. Second, bad things can happen to good people! The best advice here is to perform an ‘ounce of prevention’ to prepare for the worst case scenario.
Burglars, identity thieves, employers, and stalkers may enter your home as a potential buyer for the sole purpose of obtaining valuable information!
Disarming burglars, stalkers, and identity thieves are some of the best reasons to privatize your home prior to placing the “For Sale” sign in your front yard. Equally important reasons to protect your privacy include preventing potential home buyers from having an unfair advantage!
Burglars may watch your house to learn the general routine of household members, then review the layout with a guided tour from a real estate agent before violating your security and taking your prized valuables. It is not uncommon for burglars to enter the home as a potential buyer, and leave a door or window unlocked for later access.
Identity thieves are on the lookout for any and every piece of valuable, private information they can get their hands on! Bills, checkbooks, social security cards, voter’s registration cards, birthdates, pay stubs are just a few items that contain information valuable to an identity thief.
Employers past, present or future may be surreptitiously seeking valuable insight to your loyalty, lifestyle habits, risky behavior or potential health risks that may adversely impact health insurance costs!
Finally, the average potential home buyer may obtain a significant advantage in bargaining power if they saw the calendar circled with your move date, or the meeting with the mortgage broker regarding your home loan. Stacks of second notices for bills can imply that you are desperate to sell, and will settle for far less than your asking price.
What should you do to minimize your risk of invasion of your privacy?
1. Remove ALL private or personal photos, diplomas, awards, and trophies.
2. Remove any and all calendars! These often contain a great deal of private information that could be used to your detriment.
3. Remove ALL valuables. Consider placing them in vaults, or boxes which can be secured or easily carried with you.
4. Remove ALL bills, letters, magazines and library books. Shred papers with personal information that are no longer needed.
5. Password protect your computer to block access to your private files.
6. Turn off your printer and fax machine before each showing. Printers and fax machines often have the capability of printing the last numbers dialed or received.
7. Turn off answering machines. This avoids personal messages being left while strangers are in your home.
8. Unplug and remove phones. Many phones have caller ID.
9. Remove or conceal all digital devices that contain information about you or your family (i.e., cell phones, personal digital assistants, iPods, USB drives).
10. Do not list personal names or phone numbers on handouts or flyers with information on your property. Real estate agents should be the only ones with access to your private phone numbers.
You have managed to clean, declutter and depersonalize, but have you ‘privatized’ your home? Perhaps you know and trust everyone in your community, and feel that you have nothing to hide. Think again!
Leaving personal information for others to see may have significant consequences for you. First, while most people are kind and decent, and will respect your belongings, others will not. Second, bad things can happen to good people! The best advice here is to perform an ‘ounce of prevention’ to prepare for the worst case scenario.
Burglars, identity thieves, employers, and stalkers may enter your home as a potential buyer for the sole purpose of obtaining valuable information!
Disarming burglars, stalkers, and identity thieves are some of the best reasons to privatize your home prior to placing the “For Sale” sign in your front yard. Equally important reasons to protect your privacy include preventing potential home buyers from having an unfair advantage!
Burglars may watch your house to learn the general routine of household members, then review the layout with a guided tour from a real estate agent before violating your security and taking your prized valuables. It is not uncommon for burglars to enter the home as a potential buyer, and leave a door or window unlocked for later access.
Identity thieves are on the lookout for any and every piece of valuable, private information they can get their hands on! Bills, checkbooks, social security cards, voter’s registration cards, birthdates, pay stubs are just a few items that contain information valuable to an identity thief.
Employers past, present or future may be surreptitiously seeking valuable insight to your loyalty, lifestyle habits, risky behavior or potential health risks that may adversely impact health insurance costs!
Finally, the average potential home buyer may obtain a significant advantage in bargaining power if they saw the calendar circled with your move date, or the meeting with the mortgage broker regarding your home loan. Stacks of second notices for bills can imply that you are desperate to sell, and will settle for far less than your asking price.
What should you do to minimize your risk of invasion of your privacy?
1. Remove ALL private or personal photos, diplomas, awards, and trophies.
2. Remove any and all calendars! These often contain a great deal of private information that could be used to your detriment.
3. Remove ALL valuables. Consider placing them in vaults, or boxes which can be secured or easily carried with you.
4. Remove ALL bills, letters, magazines and library books. Shred papers with personal information that are no longer needed.
5. Password protect your computer to block access to your private files.
6. Turn off your printer and fax machine before each showing. Printers and fax machines often have the capability of printing the last numbers dialed or received.
7. Turn off answering machines. This avoids personal messages being left while strangers are in your home.
8. Unplug and remove phones. Many phones have caller ID.
9. Remove or conceal all digital devices that contain information about you or your family (i.e., cell phones, personal digital assistants, iPods, USB drives).
10. Do not list personal names or phone numbers on handouts or flyers with information on your property. Real estate agents should be the only ones with access to your private phone numbers.
