Getting Ready for Sale

Firstly, let me apologise for the lack of instructional photos - I'm still getting back into the swing of things with the blogging caper and photography still isn't at the forefront of my mind.

We met with our real estate agent on Monday to sign our Offer and Acceptance contract and to go through the house and figure out what we needed to do to make it as sale-able as possible. We've always managed to keep the house fairly tidy and clutter free, but of course our spare bedroom/my office is a complete junk room, we never got around to painting the front lounge (which we've also been using as a makeshift gym), the grout in our bathrooms was never sealed and the garden is just...blah.  So we had a bit of work today.

My main frustration has always been our en suite shower - I love white bathrooms and kitchens, so our house features white tiles and white grout.  When we built this place back in 2009 the tile company told us we would't need to bother sealing the grout because grout doesn't get discoloured.  Doesn't it, tile company, doesn't it???

These photos were taken at night, so the tiles have an apricot tinge - they're white - but you can see how disgusting the grout looked.  Please don't judge me ;)

I tried everything to clean the grout - scrubbed it, Exit Mould, Easy-Off Bam!, Ajax Shower and Bathroom, vinegar and bi-carb powder and plain old bleach to name a few, nothing would work.  Thing is, grout is pourous, so scrubbing isn't really going to help once you get to a certain point and it's already stained.

I was so fed up that I even considered getting our ensuite regrouted completely.  The quotes I got back came in at $1800, which I'm not prepared to pay considering we're trying to sell the place and I'll need that money to fix up the ensuite in the new place (call me selfish).  I'd tried painting the grout before with on of those grout pens you get at hardware stores but found it to be too uneven and came off after a couple of showers.

I spoke to a tiler friend who suggested I try MasterLine Tile Grout Colourant, which is the product he uses as a professional.  At under $10 I thought why not!  He warned me I would have to get the tiles super clean before I painted so that the colourant would adhere to the grout effectively.  So a trip to Bunnings was in order - I picked up Long Life Grout Cleaner which again, was under $15 at $14.99, a grout brush and a foam paint brush.

 

Scrubbing the grout was the worst part - the smell of the cleaner was overpowering and I probably should have worn a mask.  The grout came up really well, even with just the scrub but still had a grey-ish orange tinge to it, with black mould spots still really prominent (although softened), so I decided to proceed with the paint.

I still want to paint the ensuite floor, so I'll try to remember to take photos then so you can see the technique, but seriously, easiest thing ever.  I did two coats since the first was still a little too uneven for my liking.  But the result looks like this.

 *Angels chorus* Hallelujah!  I still want to recaulk/resilicone (whatever you call it), but I'll get to that in the next couple of days.

Our other main job was to paint the front lounge (and get rid of the sports equipment). I don't have any before photos, but here are some during.

The paint colour we used is Dulux Clay Pipe Half - we'd pretty much already painted the entire house that colour and had leftovers, so that's what we went with.  I like the colour and think I'll use it again in our next place (mostly because we have so much left over!).

After everything was cleared out and painted we rearranged the furniture like this.

I wish I had a before photo because this looks SO. MUCH. BETTER. I can't even explain.

The rest of the week was spent decluttering - we took heaps of stuff to our parents' homes; thank goodness they both have massive sheds and spare rooms! For the photos that'll go on our sale listing we threw a bunch of clutter that needs to stay at home in the laundry (they never photograph in there) and in our cars.  Baby gates came down.  Counter tops were cleared.  To give you an idea, my best friend said she didn't recognise parts of the house with all the clutter gone.

Let's just help this house sells quickly, because I don't know how long I can manage to keep up this level of pristine tidiness (especially with a toddler running around).