Monday, January 22, 2007

The house, and it's oderific inhabitants

Da kitty litter.

I thought that by taking the litter to the garage, it would solve the problem of people without cats or dogs walking in and realizing the place is running rampant with kitties.

I have gotten favorable feedback on my house, with two people 'considering' it. Now frankly, it means no one from this week's visits will put in an offer. They viewed it on Saturday mainly, and it's Monday. If they haven't put in offer in now, it's probably because they are not interested in this house. booo. I mean, we would view homes, and then make a decision. We didn't take 'days' to consider it.

But the one comment she did get was they could smell the cats in the basement... YIKES. Now, when I bought the house, I spent weeks trying to get urine pee out of the carpet in the corner, and it's barely perceptible now. I mean, I think their cat used that corner quite frequently to urinate. But I didn't think they could smell the odor from the garage... yeesh.

Any odor defeating ideas from pet owners, aside from 'throw the cats out?'

4 comments:

MommasWorld said...

Ok just because I like ya I will share a silly quick odor fix I was given while selling my house.

Hopefully, your realtor is good person and will give you at least 24 hours notice and will also follow the steps. It helps them out as well since their pay is based on selling your house.

Just as there are physical aspects of each room for a prospective buyer there are moods. The moods are such as what they want to imagine they want to use that room for and what they will do or not to make that room their own. You as the seller want to make them imagine how wonderful it would be to LIVE in each room of your house. Play up the room with the best selling point.

Sent is very important because it goes straight to the brain of imagination. Pick a very nice sent for each room. Use the plug in scents with the fan that puts out more of a sent when you press the fan button. IMPORTANT that you fuse the scents through your house so there is no discord in the sent from one room to the next. My house for sale was and my new house is still (loved the idea and kept it!)

Now for just the potential buyers, Make sure the outside and inside of each door frame is coated with a very nice oil fragrance (sold at most home depots or lowes) or at least an arisole air-freshner. The bulb rings with scented oil are very nice too. Have the carpets or wood floors cleaned if there is an odor from previous occupants. Hate to say it but cat urine is the worst to get rid of (been in pet rescue homes before and that is ug-ly). If there were cats before and they went on carpet the only way to get rid of the smell forever is to replace the old carpet and have the carpet company clean up the underlying floor. Cat urine is detectable by all cats. One "goes" in that area and it is a free pee zone for all cats for the remainder of time as I was told. My children have 2 cats and cat pissing is my worst fear.

If the odor is from the basement you might think of where your heat/air conditioning unit is. If it is in the basement and the pets were fed or a litter box was there clean the area with scented bleach and then replace the air filter as well.

Lahdeedah said...

Okay, so I picked scents for each room except the kitchen which usually gets infused with a candle scent of cinammon spice every evening. I got that febreeze alternating odor thing for the basement, am trying pine cat litter, and bought nature's miracle to spray on teh carpet.

I think the scent is more from the litter than the carpet but just to be sure...

oh and for the cat boxes, an orange citrus scent...

My house is either going to smell a) like a wonderful, delightful walk in spring sunshine, b) a perfume experiment gone wrong or c) a brothel.

I didn't put anything in the boy's room except I sprayed a nice spray that doesn't match their room at all lol so I may change that... I mean, it's perfumey and they are boys...

David said...

I don't have a suggestion, unfortunately.

I do know that, after the last of our pets died, it took a year or two before the house no longer smelled of them. To us, anyway. Visitors whose noses weren't already desensitized may still have been able to detect the smell.

So maybe trying to cover it up with something stronger or more noticeable is the only way to go.

The Curmudgeon said...

Cigars. Start smoking cigars and no one will smell the cats anymore.