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Hold off on baked cookies when selling says WSU research
February 20, 2013 @ 9:06 am (Updated: 7:06 am - 2/21/13 )
Home shoppers have long paid attention to the smell of a home, but new research suggests that some common scents can actually be a drawback.
Eric Spangenberg, dean of the college of business at Washington State University, said that complex scents, like baked goods, can be a distraction to potential homebuyers because they'll subconsciously dedicate time to try to figure out what the scent is.
But at a real estate open house, you want a potential buyer not to be distracted by processing a smell.
"They are there to process whether this is a place they want to live," said Spangenberg.
Some of the worst scents for real estate open houses: Potpourri, chocolate-chip cookies, gourmet foods, and other baked goods.
Instead simple scents - like pine, lemon, and cedar - are easier to process and less distracting, Spangenberg said.
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