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Putting your home up for sale can be quite stressful. Preparations are rushed, trying, and usually demand a lot of blood, sweat, and tears. This is especially the case if you're like most sellers and get your home ready for sale just a few weeks before putting it on the market.

The front yard

If you know in the fall that you might be selling in the spring, be sure to plant bulbs in the fall so you'll have some beautiful blooms come springtime. Many homeowners focus so much on things like paint, organizing the kitfchen, and arrangement of furniture that they forget that the yard will be the first thing that potential buyers will see when they come to view the home. A well groomed yard will go a long way towards getting buyers to believe that your house is the right house for them.

Your "honey-do" list

Get your "honey-do's" out of the way when contractors are more readily available in the off-season. Painters are usually extremely busy in the summer so negotiating a painting contract in the winter months will allow you to paint your home (especially the inside) for a better price. The same goes for hvac contractors and renting storage space.

Listing photos

How your home is photographed could mean the difference between standing out from the hundreds of other homes competing for a buyer, and not getting noticed at all. One of the best things you can do to get your home ready for sale is to keep a camera handy for taking pictures when your home won't be washed out and colorless because the picture was taken at high-noon. Murphy's law says that if you wait until you put the sign in the yard to take a picture for your home, it will be raining every day your agent shows up to take a picture.

Even if you're not planning on selling in the immediate future, the next time after it rains, see if you can take a picture of your home that just happens to be right under a rainbow. Come springtime, make sure to get an early morning picture with the gentle glow of the sun shining down on your gorgeous flowers on your front porch. It's those little touches that make a big impression.

Store it, sell it, or donate it.

Rent a storage locker well in advance, and start making occasional trips to it with the stuff you don't need. Tackle your kitchen, garage and basement first since those tend to accumulate the most unnecessary clutter. If you don't use that coffee pot taking up space on the kitchen countertop more than a couple times a week, put it away or store it. (Even if it does get regular use, if it could be easily stored out of the way - store it!) The less "stuff" is cluttering up your countertops, the roomier your kitchen will feel. If there are unused toys that are sitting around the family room, have a yard sale or donate them to godwill! The less stuff you have around in your home, the bigger it feels!

With just a little foresight, you can really enhance the experience of selling your house.