In most cases, homes look better furnished, although it is best to have them sparsely furnished as cluttered homes appear smaller and give the impression of being run down. Often, sellers will hire professional ‘home stagers’ and rent furniture for a vacant house to make it feel like a real “home”; Vacant properties often feel cold and sterile. This can be expensive though so if you are on a tight marketing budget, perhaps consider having some ‘virtual’ furniture added to your marketing images in post production to give your marketing a bit more
oomphh.
If you are an investor, selling a property that has tenants occupying can often be a tricky business. Some tenants are lovely people and are more than happy to cooperate – However some tenants you will find to be extremely difficult. Access is a constant problem, and often they will not make any effort to clean or present the house for buyer viewings, which will impact your chances of a sale and the price you will most likely get.
If you have a difficult tenant, then it is best to evict them prior to marketing. This will give you an opportunity to fix the place up a bit and hopefully increase your potential sale price. It will also ensure your agent has access to the property whenever they need it.
If you do decide to sell the property vacant, you then have to deal with the conundrum of not deriving any rental income from the property. If there is a mortgage in place, and the interest payments are dependent on the rental income, this could present a serious cash flow problem for you as you are responsible for making up the payment from elsewhere.
More on this here.