As I walked towards the house, I smelled the strongest objectionable smell that ever offended my nostrils...

Recently, Irene and I were showing a beautiful home to a client in Douglas County. The home had updated everything. An amazing custom finished basement. Perfect landscaping. 20 minutes from Denver Tech Center and 10 minutes from shopping for anything you might want. A very quiet neighborhood. A stunning view of Pikes Peak.  The homes staging was outstanding. The home was priced right.  The home had the right everything…price, condition, location. Yet, for some reason the home had been on the market for a couple weeks…with no offers.  

As soon as I walked half way up the driveway, I knew why the home was not under contract. Entering the home confirmed what my nose was telling me. Too many plug-in air fresheners were being used in the home.  The home owner was possibly a plug-in air freshener investor.  I stopped counting at 11 air fresheners.  In two of the electrical outlets there was 2 different scented air fresheners in the same outlet. My buyers loved the home and were considering putting an offer. However, in the end…the only thing anyone could remember about the home was the smell and leaving to get fresh air.  All the wonderful things about it were gone.   

I am one of those people who has a very sensitive nose. I have always smelled things that most people don’t.  Most house and car air fresheners smell like chemicals with a hint of whatever the label says it is.  Christophe Laudamiel a famous French perfumer said, “Each smell should be considered like a painting, a sculpture or a beautiful story.”  This quote makes sense to me.  It is more than difficult selling a home with a bad or overwhelming odor. The smells in the home should provide comfort and enhance the homes qualities. 

Fortunately for me a natural, normal people, family type smell doesn't bother me like a chemical smell.  Most types of deodorizers and deodorants smell like chemicals to me.   My mother and sisters have the same gift of smell. This gift can be pleasant or a curse depending on the circumstances.    

When I go into a home that has been closed for a while, I will catch a whiff of something unpleasant as I walk in. I have come to realize most people living in the home don’t know there is an uncomfortable smell. They have been living with it and can ignore it.

I suspect this home was trying to cover up the smell of tobacco use and pet smells.    

Tobacco smoke has a unique unpleasant scent.  To me it is detectable on a breeze from a mile away. I can smell the ambient odor of a heavy smoker from half a mile away. The scent of cigarette smoke in the home of a heavy smoker is not pleasant. and it is a smell that is very hard to get rid of inside a home.  Worse than pet odors.  Air fresheners, no matter how many are used, are probably not going to do the job. The best way I have found to get rid of the tobacco smells and pet odors is to first scrub everything with white vinegar. Then remove the floor covering and paint Kilz on everything that is nailed down. Even then on a really hot day I can still get a whiff of burnt tobacco. 

After the home showing fiasco, I thought I should update this post. With the colder months coming people will be keeping their windows and doors closed.   

DIY homemade air freshener that you see on social media sites can be ridiculous. I decided to try some of these to see if they work and if I was right about how dumb they are…or dangerous.  

I absolutely love walking into a home or business that has a noticeable and wonderful smell when you walk into it. Irene and I are always looking for ways to improve our Real Estate clients experience. One of the things I am always looking for is a way to make a home smell pleasingly agreeable in a consistent and sustained manner, without being overpowering.  The smell from baking bread or cookies only lasts so long and can be messy. Most of the smell good stuff bought at a store or thru Amazon has a chemical smell.  I do love the smells of most Yankee Candle products and Bath and Body Works infusers and soaps.  Drawback is I don’t feel comfortable having an open flame in my client’s home. The infusers are great for a small bathroom but not the entire home.   

I decided to try a couple of ideas posted on a well-known and respected social media site. 

The first one I tried was reported as…put a tablespoon of vanilla extract, in the oven for couple hours and the whole house will smell wonderful for days.  It made the kitchen smell “Just, ok” for about 15 minutes. The vanilla stuck to the old cookie sheet. Later, I used aluminum foil to cover the cookie sheet, with even more vanilla and this did not work at all.  

Next smell good project was to use rosemary, vanilla extract, and a sliced lemon. They were to be added to pot of water, then simmered for a couple hours.  This concoction did nothing to make anything smell better. I think if you used a huge pan with 30 or 40 pounds of rosemary, vanilla, and lemons it might work. The expense of the ingredients made it cost prohibitive compared to buying a can of Febreze. 

The third smelled good experiment, shouted out from the page “Powerful mixture that can make your house smell so good so even your neighbors will envy you.” I was half hoping this “mixture” might be the one we are looking for. This formula was essentially a mixture of baking soda, fabric softener, water, and a spray bottle. This smelled to me like a laundry room using a dirty HE clothes washing machine. Fortunately, the smell did not last more than a few minutes.  

The best method I have found is good old mother nature.  Just open your windows and doors on a warm breezy day and let the clean air give everything a bath.  I think for the colder months or on rainy days we will continue to use Yankee Candles in our home and a couple shots of Mountain Air Febreze as needed.  

By the way our client’s could not picture themselves living in the home without having an air freshener induced headache. Last I looked the home was still on the market. I don’t know why the flat fee listing agent allowed the air quality in the home to get this bad. I don’t know why the home owner is not questioning why they did not sell the home quickly and make them a bushel of money. I do know Irene and I take our fiduciary responsibility to our client’s very seriously.  When you hire us to sell your home we have a system in place that would not allow a similar circumstance to occur.

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What is your answer to getting rid of unpleasant odors in a home?