Selling · 6 min read
The Pre-Listing Exterior Checklist: What to Clean Before You List
Almost every guide to prepping a house for sale is about the inside. But the outside is what a buyer sees first, and it sets the impression every room afterwards has to work against. Here is what actually matters out there, in order — including the parts worth skipping.
The one piece of timing advice that matters
Do the outside before the photographer comes, not after the sign goes up. Listing photos are taken once and then do the work for the entire time the house is on the market. Cleaning a week into the listing improves the house for the people who already decided to book a showing — which is precisely the audience that needed the least convincing.
The checklist, in the order a buyer sees it
Ordered by what a buyer’s eye reaches first, not by what costs the most — so if the budget or the calendar runs out halfway, you are still ahead.
1
The approach — driveway, walkway, front steps
Why it matters: This is the first photo in most listings and the first ten seconds of every showing. Concrete and pavers go green and black slowly enough that the owner stopped seeing it years ago, and a buyer sees nothing else.
Doing it yourself: Genuinely DIY-able with a rented pressure washer and patience — but use a surface cleaner attachment, not the wand. A wand leaves zebra striping that looks worse than the dirt did and cannot be undone. Never point high pressure at paver joints; you will blow the sand out.
How concrete cleaning actually works →2
Exterior windows
Why it matters: The highest-leverage item on this list, and the least obvious. Most interior listing photos are shot toward a window. Dirty exterior glass puts a grey film over the light coming into every one of those rooms — so the windows quietly damage photos that are not of the windows.
Doing it yourself: Ground-floor glass, yes. Anything needing a ladder, no — a fall while prepping a house for sale is the worst possible trade. Skip the paper-towel-and-blue-spray approach on a whole house; it streaks in sun and you will see it in the photos.
What window cleaning costs and how often →3
Siding, soffits and eaves
Why it matters: Green or black growth on the shaded walls reads as a neglected house — buyers do not think "algae," they think "what else has been let go?" It is also the cheapest possible way to make a house look younger than it is.
Doing it yourself: This is the one to be careful with. Siding needs a soft wash — detergent doing the work at low pressure — not a pressure washer. High pressure forces water behind vinyl and strips paint, and it only knocks the top layer off the growth, which comes back within a season.
Soft washing vs. pressure washing →4
The deck, porch or dock
Why it matters: Outdoor living space is a real selling feature in cottage country, and a grey, mossy deck sells it short. A washed and brightened deck photographs like a feature; a dirty one photographs like a maintenance item.
Doing it yourself: Possible, easy to wreck. Wood takes pressure damage fast, and the furring you raise does not go away. Composite has its own rules.
Deck restoration, honestly →5
Gutters
Why it matters: Barely matters in the photos. Matters in the home inspection, and matters more if the house sits through a wet month while it is listed — overflow marks siding and can put water where a buyer’s inspector will find it.
Doing it yourself: Only from the ground or a properly footed ladder, and honestly: this is the job that puts homeowners in hospital. If the house is more than one storey, hire it out.
How often gutters really need it →6
The roof — only if it is streaked
Why it matters: Black streaking on shingles is algae, not wear. Buyers read it as a roof that needs replacing, and that becomes a number in an offer. Worth removing precisely because of what it is mistaken for.
Doing it yourself: No. Walking a roof to clean it is both dangerous and how shingles get damaged, and pressure washing a roof destroys it outright.
Why roofs get streaked and how they are cleaned →Just as useful
What to skip.
Money spent here is money not spent on the move. These are the ones we talk people out of.
Sealing a driveway to make it look better. Sealer over a dirty driveway locks the staining in, and a fresh seal on a listing reads to some inspectors as covering something.
Painting siding that only needs washing. It is a common and expensive mistake — a lot of "the siding needs painting" is oxidation or growth that comes off.
Anything at all on a ladder to save money. This is the single worst risk-to-reward trade in the whole process.
If you are hiring it out
Whoever you use — us or anyone — the questions worth asking are the same, and we have written them down with our own answers on the record in how to hire an exterior cleaner. The short version for a listing specifically:
- Ask for proof of insurance and WSIB before they start. Without WSIB, a worker injured on your property can become your liability — while you are trying to close a sale.
- Ask what they use on siding. “We turn the pressure down” is not a soft wash.
- Ask whether the price is firm. A price that only exists after a walk-around was priced to you, not to the job.
- Tell them the photo date up front and ask them to confirm it in writing. A company that will not commit to a date before the photographer is a company that is going to miss it.
Common questions
What should I clean before listing my house?
In order of what a buyer sees first: the approach (driveway, walkway, front steps), the windows, the siding, and then the deck. Gutters and the roof matter less for photos and more for the home inspection. If you only do one thing, do the windows — dirty exterior glass dulls every interior photo taken toward a window, which is most of them.
How long before the photos should exterior cleaning be done?
A few days ahead is ideal — enough margin that weather can move the job without moving the photo date. Exterior cleaning results do not fade in a week; the risk is scheduling, not longevity.
Do I need to clean the windows inside as well as outside?
Outside is where the money is. Exterior glass takes the weather and is what dulls a photo shot from inside a room. Interior glass is worth doing if the house is occupied and the showings will be close-up, and it is the one part that needs someone home to let a cleaner in.
Getting a price
Our prices are published and flat-rate by home size — you can see the number for a house your size on the pricing page, or get yours in about a minute with the instant quote tool. No email needed, and nobody calls you unless you ask them to.
If you would rather just talk to someone: (705) 242-4888, or [email protected]. Blair & Liz — Based in Victoria Harbour, Ontario.
Agents: there is a version of this written for you, with how scheduling around a photo date works — Nord for real estate agents →