The Wellington homeowner's pre-sale exterior checklist

KhandallahColoured-press concrete drive on Ampur Drive, listed and sold the month after this clean. The drone shot of this property was a buying signal.

The single biggest piece of advice every Wellington real-estate agent gives sellers is also the cheapest: wash the exterior before the listing photos. Not the inside (the buyer’s imagination handles that). Not the garden (a tidy lawn beats a full landscape). The exterior wash, house, driveway, roof, paths, is what makes the listing photos look like they belong on a $1.2M property instead of a $1M one.

We’ve done hundreds of pre-listing exteriors over 25 years, often coordinated directly with the real-estate agent. The pattern is consistent enough to turn into a checklist. Here it is, ordered roughly by return-on-investment.

The pre-sale exterior checklist

Priority 1, the photo essentials (do these or don’t bother selling)

Total Priority 1 budget: $430–1,100 for most Wellington homes. ROI on listing offer: typically multiples of that.

Priority 2, the things buyers notice on the walk-through

Priority 3, only if budget allows

• Garage door wash, included in most house washes anyway
• Window-frame clean, included in soft wash
• Letterbox + house number, DIY job, 10 minutes
• Outdoor furniture wipe-down, DIY job, saves the photographer’s time

When to book it

4 to 6 weeks before the listing date is the sweet spot. That gives time for:

• Any moss/lichen treatment on the roof to fully die off and rinse clean (typically 2–4 weeks)
• The garden to recover from foot-traffic and water runoff
• A weather window if the first attempt gets rained out
• Listing photos to be taken on a clean day, in good light

Do NOT book it the week of listing photos. Three reasons:

1. Weather risk, Wellington forecasts can collapse 48 hours out. Booking close to photo day means you might have to delay both the wash and the photos.
2. Moss treatment timing, roof treatments need 2–4 weeks to show results. A roof washed the day before photos still has visible dead moss waiting to rinse off.
3. Driveway oxidation, freshly-blasted concrete is slightly darker than concrete that’s settled for a fortnight. Photos taken on freshly-cleaned concrete can actually look worse than concrete cleaned 3 weeks earlier.

Common pre-sale mistakes

Doing the wrong order. Roof first (it sheds debris into gutters), then gutters, then house (which catches roof drift on rinse), then driveway last (where everything else ends up). Inverted order means repeat-cleaning the lower stuff.

Skipping the roof. Aerial drone shots are standard for Wellington listings now. A clean house with a moss-streaked roof in the drone photo undermines the whole effort.

Going too hard on the paint. Some sellers ask for a touch-up of paint at the same time. Don’t repaint just for sale unless paint is visibly failing, a fresh paint job is too obviously a sale-prep move and can read as “what are they hiding?”. A clean existing paint job photographs well and looks honest.

Power-washing the deck right before the open home. Decks need 48–72 hours to fully dry before they look right. Same goes for re-staining, if you’re doing it, plan for 5–7 days of dry weather between clean and stain.

Coordinating with the agent’s photographer. Photographers don’t usually want freshly-wet surfaces in shots. Brief them on what was done and when so they can plan around drying times.

What about the inside?

Out of scope for us, but the universal agent advice is:

• Declutter ruthlessly (sellers always under-declutter by half)
• Neutral paint colours, fresh white where possible
• Replace tired light fittings, cheap signal of care
• Deep clean professionally, especially carpets and bathrooms
• Repair anything visibly broken (loose handles, leaky taps, scuffed walls)

These don’t overlap with what we do, but they pair with a clean exterior to lift the whole presentation.

The Wellington-specific bit

A few things matter more in Wellington than in other NZ cities:

1. Coastal salt deposit. Lyall Bay, Island Bay, Eastbourne, Petone foreshore, Kapiti Coast, properties here need salt-neutralising chemistry, not just water. A standard house wash doesn’t remove the underlying salt; the home re-greys within 8 weeks. Either book the coastal-grade wash, or accept that you’ll need another touch-up between photos and open home.

2. South-facing roof moss. Newlands, Brooklyn, Kelburn upper streets, south-facing roofs grow visible moss faster than the average. Allow extra dwell time on the roof treatment.

3. Southerly storms during open-home season. Spring listings are common in Wellington (Sept–Nov is the peak market). Spring is also peak southerly season. Plan a buffer day or two for weather.

4. Drone shots. Most Wellington agents commission drone photography for listings now. The roof and the surrounding outdoor surfaces (drive, deck, lawn) all become photo subjects. Clean roof + clean drive + clean deck is the trifecta.

What it costs to do the lot

A typical Priority 1 + Priority 2 combo for a 3-bedroom Wellington home runs $900–1,800 for the full exterior pre-sale prep. Compared to the typical Wellington listing-price uplift from a well-presented home (often $10–50k), the ROI is one of the highest single pre-sale spends available.

Some sellers also include the small extras (spider web treatment, letterbox, window frames), we cover most of these in the house wash itself.

Want it done?

If you’re listing in the next 6 weeks, send through your address and a copy of the listing date. We’ll come quote, and James will work backward from the photo day to schedule the exterior work at the right time.

James, Clear Water Blasting. Hundreds of pre-listing jobs across Wellington.