What do home buyers really want? Most buyers who visit your home for a viewing will be looking for a property with roughly your number of rooms and more or less in your neighborhood. But the details that turn an interested browser into a keen buyer can be harder to identify. Sadly, even the most experienced seller lacks the Mel Gibson-like ability to hear a client’s thoughts.
What we do have are statistics: the ability to crunch the numbers and see how fast homes with certain features sell after going on the market, and examining these figures reveals a changing market. “Post-pandemic home buyers who had plenty of time for self-reflection now have a greater sense of what they want and need in a home,” reports the real-estate marketplace company, Zillow. “That said, sellers who have invested in personalized features may have to wait a bit longer to find the right buyer. For instance, homes with she sheds can sell for 2.5% more than expected, but spend an extra two days on the market.”
While there are some features — central heating, double-glazing — that buyers may insist on before even looking at a property, finer details such as shelving or a heated towel rack can make a browser feel instantly at home and more likely to put in an offer right away. To find out which details can seal the deal the quickest, we calculated the average number of days a house with each feature takes to sell.
What We Did
Data analysts at Frontdoor identified over 100 of the most popular and trending home features and used Zillow’s keyword filter to find sold homes with these features in every state. Then, we calculated the average number of days that the homes with each feature took to sell and ranked these features overall, by room and just for eco-conscious (green) features.
Key Findings
- Homes with Vanity Lighting sell in an average of 44 days, the quickest of any feature.
- The most attractive feature in the kitchen is a Butcher Block — homes with this feature sell in 49 days on average.
- Open Shelving (47 days) is the most attractive feature to add to a living room.
- The green feature that sells homes quickest is an Electric Vehicle (EV) Charger (50 days).
The Features Homebuyers Want in Their New Homes Right Now
The two most desirable features for a quick home sale are both unique to the bathroom. Vanity Lighting is the greatest selling point of all — and better still, it’s a feature you can achieve as a DIY project.
This type of wall fixture illuminates your face while shaving, applying cosmetics, flossing and so on — but done well, vanity lighting can also add shape and atmosphere to the room. It can be quite straightforward to upgrade existing vanity lights using home tools and basic supplies. But if you’re installing from scratch or not confident working with electrics, you may prefer to call a pro.
Two of the top five features for a quick sale are wall-based, and two relate to lighting. Lighting can define a room in more or less obvious ways: signature fixtures such as chandeliers can move a house in 48 days, while subtle but warm or bright lighting can make a kitchen feel practical or a bedroom feel both cozy and spacious.
However, it is worth remembering that most viewings will take place in daylight and that natural light tends to feel fresh and make a space look soft and welcoming — so be wary of showboating your light fixtures at the expense of open curtains and blinds or an open fire if you have one.
A Butcher Block is the Kitchen Feature That Sells Homes the Quickest
The most effective kitchen detail for a quick home sale is a Butcher Block. A wooden butcher block countertop or standalone block gives a kitchen a sense of timeless farmhouse style. It feels traditional yet guarantees years of endurance. Not only is a butcher block durable but it can be maintained and refurbished more easily than other surface types (as long as your buyer is comfortable with it looking a little weatherworn along the way).
The average time to sell a home with a Butcher Block is 49 days. This makes it the quickest kitchen feature by three days and way ahead of Marble (54), Granite (55) and Waterfall (55) countertops.
The appeal of the farmhouse aesthetic is backed up by the number three most effective feature: the Farmhouse Sink (53 days) achieves a rare balance of style and function, offering a deep basin and champion durability.
The Living Room Features That Homebuyers Love
Wall and lighting features dominate among the very top living room features associated with quick home sales. Open Shelving and Exposed Brick Walls are the joint most effective features. Homes with either of these features sell in an average of 47 days.
Exposed Brick Walls are used “as a selling point by real estate agents everywhere,” claims the New York Times, to “add texture, character and a sense of history to a home.” However, the success of this aesthetic depends very much on the type of brick and the broader style of the room, with rustic or contemporary industrial looks making a better fit.
Open Shelving can make a room seem bigger by removing a whole layer of surfaces from one or more walls. Open shelves are also a great way to style a home since the seller can curate décor pieces or carefully Wes Andersonified arrangements of books and other belongings, leading the buyer to imagine expressing their own personality as they make themselves at home.
However, Open Shelving conflicts with another seller priority: the removal of clutter. It also requires an awful lot of dusting over those 47 or more days while your living room is a showroom. So, it is important to decide whether it is something you can commit to as a seller.
Bathroom Lighting and Tiles Sell a Home Quicker Than A Fancy Tub
Vanity Lighting (44 days — see Features Homebuyers Want in Their New Homes Right Now, above) and Stone Tile Floor (45.5) are the best bets for a quick home sale in the bathroom and the whole of our report.
Stone is durable, and its aesthetics actually improve with age. A stone floor tells potential buyers they won’t have to completely renovate the bathroom when they move in, and stone’s natural resistance to water may make buyers feel more secure. Realtor.com found that stone tile offers a 55-70% return on investment.
Bathing solutions vary in their effectiveness at hastening a sale. A Deep Soaking Tub offers the quickest sale, at an average of 53 days, ties with a Sunken Tub. A Walk-In Shower (58), Sauna (60) or Jacuzzi Bath (63) are significantly less effective at encouraging buyers.
“For resale, focus on the visuals,” suggests Cameron Snyder, former president of the National Kitchen & Bath Association (NKBA). “[N]ice tile, nice colors, nice fixtures—and don't spend a lot on the high-end utilities because most people can't tell the difference.”
Homebuyers Prefer Practical Yard Features
Believe it or not, artificial grass is the yard feature that will help sell your home the quickest — an average of 48 days. Perhaps buyers are drawn by the low-maintenance feel of a lawn that doesn’t need mowing.
However, if you are not planning to sell for a while, note that the low-maintenance feel is somewhat illusory: artificial grass requires vacuuming, washing and even weeding. Artificial grass may also be a complete no-no for some buyers, especially as reports of ‘astroturf regret’ circulate and consumers continue to shun plastics.
Different types of structures you might build in your garden offer various levels of apparent benefit in encouraging a quick sale. A Shed or Pergola (both 49 days) are simple, practical structures, offering storage or shelter in a yard.
Fancier structures offer less advantage in securing a deal. A Pizza Oven or Conservatory (both 56 days) or Outdoor Kitchen (62) may be seen as a luxury and are less likely to feature prominently in a buyer’s “Needs and Wants” list.
The Green Home Features That Can Hasten a Sale
Responsible consumers are increasingly thinking green when making a purchase, and that includes the biggest buy they may ever make: a home. The most alluring green feature is an EV (electric vehicle) charger, which offers immediate benefits to electric car owners while offsetting the worry that they will eventually need to fit one.
Other popular green features offer not just eco benefits but economic ones. Smart Lighting (52 days) and Solar Panels (53) reduce traditional energy consumption by reducing, respectively, the time that lights are on and the home’s reliance on fossil fuels.
Plus, there are overall benefits to giving your home a green profile. Besides the good feeling of selling an eco-friendly ‘product’ (i.e., your home), you might note that two-thirds of realtors say energy efficiency is a “very” or “somewhat” valuable feature in listings.
Thoughtful Renovations
Selling a home can be a long and emotional process, and trying to predict the market is never a guaranteed means of hastening a sale or boosting your home’s price. However, with imagination and love, the home improvements you prioritize may well resonate with buyers who sense the care and practical thinking embedded in your property.
Open the Frontdoor
With the Frontdoor app, a better way to home repair is here. You can video chat with plumbing, electrical, appliance, HVAC and handyman Experts in real-time for all your home repair needs. They’ll give you step-by-step guidance to complete the repair or help you find the right local Pro when in-home help is needed. Download the Frontdoor app today to start taking control of your home repair to-do list. Your first video chat is free!
Methodology
To rank the home features that sell homes quicker, we calculated the median days that homes containing each home feature took to sell, based on the Sold Homes database on Zillow.
We started by building a seed list of over 100 of the most popular and trending home features across every room of the house (and the yard), sourced from authoritative home and yard publications in the previous 12 months.
Next, we used the keyword filter inside Zillow to isolate sold homes, which included each home feature in every state.
We then calculated the median days that homes with each feature took to sell from the listing date by recording the sale history dates of every home in the database.
Notes:
- This analysis includes a total of 112,456 home listings and was completed in March 2024.
- The data does not show a direct correlation (i.e., install this feature, and your home will sell quicker). Instead, it's more of an indication that certain features in a home are indicative of a home that has qualities that are desirable.
Was this article helpful?
