Expert: Jessica Bryan - 2/25/2007

Question

Why scents may not make cents when trying to sell your home.

For many home sellers who believe the TV commercials that claim chemical sprays “sanitize” the air, plug-ins “freshen” the air and Fragrance emitting devices actually clean the air, well…this may not be good news.

The savvy home buyer has added chemical fragrances to their list of what they don’t want to smell when they are looking to buy a home. These chemical fragrances are now listed right next to mold, cigarette smoke odor and animal urine by many home buyers.

Home buyers today are more educated than ever. Even inexperienced first time home buyers understand that fragrances do not clean the air, they contaminate it and more often than not make people very sick. They have kids with asthma and allergies. They themselves might suffer from migraines, anaphylaxis or fragrance sensitivity.

Home buyers know that clean should not have a smell. So, while the location, square footage and price of your home might be perfect for your would be buyer, the smell of your home just might be the deciding factor on why an offer was not written up.

What does your house smell like?

Once plug in style fragrance emitting devices are used in a home, the oil / fragrance permeates the sheetrock as well as flooring. Similar goes for the fragranced dryer sheets in the laundry room. These chemical odors then circulate in the air vent system and will never come out, no matter what you do.

With the growing population of people suffering with fragrance sensitivity, Asthma and allergies, house hunting can often prove to be quite a challenge.

If you are in the market to sell your home, increase your odds of getting top dollar and more offers by discontinuing the use of fragranced products. Open your windows and let the fresh air in.  Clean with non-fragranced products. . Your house will then be marketable to all potential buyers... even those with health issues.

After all, you do want your home to take a buyers breath away... but not literally.  

Answer
Dear Kathy;
There doesn't seem to be a question here but a very good point.  It is true that there are some people who have sensitivities to fragrances and no home should have heavy aromas that assail the nose when you walk in.  However, there are other smells that are offensive.  when a home is vacant and closed up all the time the first smell when you open the door is sometimes musty and bad.  That is when I recommend something light and clean smelling to offset that horrible first impression of closed and musty.  The best thing to have going is an air cleaner rather than a freshener (like a hepa or ozone filter.)Not every home seller can do this so they resort to commercial air fresheners.  I always advise to go very light on these and use something that is like spring rain.

You made some excellent points.  I hope that there are people out there reading this and learning from it.

~Jessica Bryan