Selling Your Home? Mention That Home Office!

For years, we’ve all heard about the most desirable home features buyers are looking for: upgraded kitchens, remodeled bathrooms, master suites, and more. The latest on the hotlist, however, might surprise you: home offices.

With stay-at-home orders, having a good place to work from home is crucial. If you’ve been thinking of selling your home, it will be more desirable and sell faster if you mention you have a dedicated home office space.

In a recent article by George Ratiu, Senior Economist with realtor.com, he notes how listings with an office are selling far more quickly than those without: “As more companies have been embracing remote work, buyers are driving demand for houses with home offices higher. Homes featuring the term ‘office’ are selling 9 days faster than the overall housing inventory.”

Home Office Design Considerations

According to the most recent data available, the number of employees working at home was fairly steady from 1997 – 2004 but has been climbing ever since. Clearly, the work-from-home population is growing, and technology is making it possible. Just last month, according to an article on Think Google, searches for telecommuting hit an all-time high, and that’s certainly no surprise given our current situation.

People are looking for answers on how to be most effective at home, and it’s making the ideal workspace more and more sought after. In fact, best practices from seasoned work-from-home professionals, like Chris Anderson from HousingWire, tout that having a dedicated space is a must for productivity.

So if you do have a separate home office space, it’s a great feature to highlight within your sales listing. Home office design matters too. From bright natural light with large windows to built-in bookshelves – talk about whatever makes your office space shine.

Ratiu concludes:
“For housing, the continued increase in the share of remote workers implies that demand for homes with offices or dedicated work spaces will continue to increase. The current coronavirus pandemic offers a dramatic indication of the fact that companies and employees will have to develop plans and clearer policies for remote work beyond the current crisis.”

The Bottom Line

Remote work may become more widely accepted as this current crisis teaches businesses throughout the country what it takes to function virtually. So, what seems like a business challenge today may be more of the norm tomorrow. With that in mind – if you have a home office and are in the market to sell your home, be sure to mention all of its perks.

And if you want a CRS realtor to guide you through the process of selling your home, give me a call!