Dogs in the house - bad idea!

I am the world's biggest dog lover but I couldn't agree more.  Not everyone shares my love of dogs.  I showed a house about a month back where both my buyer and I got bit.  I don't like that dog.  We bought a different house.  That dog cost the seller a sale.  Their house was equally as nice, on the same street and priced $20,000 less.  We didn't even consider it.

We had a property once, the seller had 2 Boxers!  The house had a invisible fence!  Tanya is scared to death of dogs!  It was too funny to me, not so much for Tanya!  While we were in the house the dogs kept pacing around the back door looking at us!  This was soooo funny to me!  So yes, please put the animals AWAY

Good post.

Couldn't agree more.

I have seen the presence of an owner's pet at a showing absolutely kill the buyer's interest!

I agree with you.  I have pets but I know if I had to sell my house, I'd have to move out because I can't keep a clean house, even without pets.

A lot of times it is very hard to do something with the animal every time a showing happens.  I tell my clients to make sure their animal is secured.

On a recent consultation at a home that has been on the market for a month already, I was greeted and followed around by 2 dogs and 5 cats.  Thank God I am not afraid of animals!  As hard as I tried to avoid them, they show up in most of my before photos - they were everywhere!  When I asked the owner where the animals were kept during showings, he said he would take the dogs out of the house with him, but the five cats stayed.  OMG!  Let's hope I was able to persuade him to see the light!

Bill,

This is a very good point. I recently opened the front door to a house to have a snarling pitbull charge at me. No mention of a dog in the listing and I had left a message with the seller three hours earlier.

Fortunately I got the door shut before he could get to it. Needless to to say we crossed this one off the list in a nano second.

Nicely said.  And, Susan is right.  That's the effect, even though we might be pet people, your pets are naturally territorial as we are coming into their space.  AND we as Realtors can't risk the liablility of a client getting bitten, nor should you.  It can be off putting for the client with allergies and/or who don't mind their own pets, but not someone elses.  Just good business to keep pets out of the picture, let them imagine their pet there, not yours.  Same reason we stage homes is to take the seller out of the picture and let the buyer put themselves into the picture. 

Great points.  Some people are actually afraid of dogs, too.  My nephews are and no one seems to believe me until one of them starts crying and climbing up me to get away from the dog. 

I love my little guys. I have four dogs and they are truly family members BUT we encourage all our clients to leave no smells and no live animals in the house while showing. Family and friends are usually very happy to babysit for a while. Kym