When you are going to be showing your house to buyers, you have a lot of preparations to take care of. Along with doing your best to make necessary repairs and present the house in eye appealing shape, you also want to be sure it has a pleasant smell to it. If you have buyers come through a house with bad odors, then it can really hinder your ability to sell the home fast. Consider following the advice here to make sure you aren't showing your home while it has offensive odors:

Don't trust your own nose – When you live in your home full-time you will naturally get used to all its odors, even the bad ones. This means you won't be able to smell them once they become a normal part of your living environment. If you are concerned that you may have odors in your home, have someone you trust to be honest with you come walk through the house with you. They will be able to smell all the same odors a buyer would, whether it be odors from pets, cigarettes, dirty laundry or anything else.

Clean up after your pets daily – If you normally clean your cat's litter box a few times a day, or pick up your dog's excrement in the back yard once a week, you should consider changing the way you do things and make it a point to clean up after them every day. This way, you are decreasing the chances of buyers coming out and smelling the odors from these things.

Clean your house with the right products – There are some cleaning products that temporarily remove odors and there are others that completely remove the odors and leave a nice scent behind. You will be better off cleaning your home with the latter. Some scents you can find in cleaning items that tend to linger and leave a longer standing pleasant scent include citrus scents, peppermint and bergamot.

Other ways to create nice smells - Throwing something like bread, pie, cake or cookies into the oven to bake before a showing can give off a fantastic scent that adds to the coziness of your home. This is why baking goods in the oven ahead of time has become a real estate trick used by many agents for open houses. Not only does it give off a smell people will love, but it also makes people feel like they are in a place they can call home.