Selling a long-time home requires thoughtful planning, emotional readiness, and a strategy rooted in clarity. In this special episode of How to Sell Your Atlanta Home with Sage and Grace, host Judy Jernigan sits down with real clients Jim and Karen McColgan to discuss how they sold their Atlanta home 18 times faster than the neighborhood average and achieved the highest sale ever recorded in their community.
Their experience is a real-world example of how early preparation, smart decision-making, and partnership with the right Realtor can lead to an outcome that exceeds expectations.
Jim and Karen McColgan are recent Atlanta home sellers who partnered with Judy and the Sage and Grace Realty Group to prepare, position, and market their home thoughtfully.
Jim’s commercial appraisal expertise provided structure and logic, while Karen’s focus on emotional clarity and long-term goals ensured every decision aligned with their next chapter. Their collaborative and intentional approach created a meaningful and highly successful sale.
Jim and Karen worked on an 18-month preparation plan that covered small repairs, organization, strategic updates, and emotional readiness. Their long runway allowed them to make decisions intentionally, not reactively.
Jim’s background in commercial appraisal shaped their approach: identify issues early, fix what matters most, and eliminate surprises for buyers.
Simple improvements made a significant visual impact. With staging support and thoughtful editing, the home showed beautifully online and in person.
Their pricing strategy balanced data, market demand, and buyer psychology. Opening weekend activity confirmed that their preparation paid off.
Removing personal items helped potential buyers imagine themselves in the space. At the same time, it helped Karen emotionally prepare for the transition.
Judy shares the unseen work, communication, coordination, strategy sessions, and advocacy that guided this sale to a strong result.
The home sold for 101 percent of list price, became the highest sale in the neighborhood, and created a smooth transition into their next chapter.
A top-dollar sale doesn’t happen by accident. It comes from intentional planning, smart updates, strategic pricing, and clarity around your goals. Jim and Karen’s success shows how powerful the right approach can be — especially when you give yourself time and partner with a Realtor who prioritizes both the emotional and financial sides of your move.
These resources deepen the concepts explored in this episode:
Why This Real Estate Power Move Matters for Atlanta Homeowners
To help sellers plan ahead and understand how smart strategy changes everything:
Selling your home is a major life event. If you’re looking for a strategy that honors your financial, logistical, and emotional priorities, Judy is available to guide you.
Schedule a personal strategy consultation
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Transcript
[JUDY] Selling a home you've lived in for decades isn't just a transaction, it's a big transition, and when that transition results in the highest price ever paid in the neighborhood at closing, it's something worth celebrating. Today I'm joined by Jim and Karen who are going to share their experience selling their home in North Atlanta. We're going to talk about what worked and what didn't, and how we went from our first meeting to their smooth closing in about a year and a half because it's never too early to start planning. Selling a home isn't just about putting up a for sale sign, it's about strategy, marketing, and negotiation. But how do you know if you're making the right moves? I'm Judy Jernigan, recognized among the top 5% by the Atlanta Realtors and your host of How to Sell Your Atlanta Home with Sage and Grace, smart homeowner strategies, successful real estate sales. With a background in broadcasting, negotiation, and education, I bring a unique perspective to home sales, helping homeowners sell faster for top dollar and with less hassle while understanding not just the financial side but also the logistical and emotional considerations of a move. This show helps you plan ahead, navigate the market, and work more effectively with a realtor like me. You'll get expert insights from my guests plus real actionable strategies to sell with confidence. Now here's the show, moving you forward with Sage Advice and Grace. Today I'm so excited to be joined by Jim and Karen. We are at the closing table. They just closed their home. I've been fortunate enough to know them and work with them for over a year and a half and y'all made many smart decisions along the way. Thank you for doing this with me. So Jim, do you remember the day we met? [JIM] I do indeed. [JUDY] How did we meet? [JIM] You were selling one of the neighbor's houses and you were having a showing and I sort of happened by and we met. [JUDY] You were interviewing me and you gave me the opportunity to interview a couple different times which I appreciated just to see if we were going to be a good fit to work each other. You have a background in appraisals, right? [JIM] Correct, yeah, but not residential. It's commercial. [JUDY] Still, I always appreciated that you had a lot of good questions for me and you did bring real estate knowledge that not everybody has. Let's talk about some of the first times that we met. Karen, do you remember this? When we first met, you had written down a list of what the online valuation tools said your home was worth. So you'd looked at Redfin and Zillow and Trulia and that impressed me because it's something that I do not because we can put really much weight in those values, but it is something people look at and we need to control the narrative. So we need to know what those numbers say and if they're low or high, I need to be able to explain why. Anyway, do you remember some of our early conversations? I do. [KAREN] I remember that they were not always correct either. The number of bathrooms or bedrooms sometimes was different and that's all I remember. [JUDY] It's a really good point. It's where a lot of people, when they first start thinking about selling a home, where they go and they look to see what they say and there's really no price. [KAREN] I never really cared about the price. I cared about our walk away amount money. And I said, whatever we can make happen so that I get X number of money and we are there within $2,000. So yes, that's good. [JUDY] Glad to hear that. So we did talk about that. We had that conversation a few different times about the ROI of what to do versus what not to do. You had already done some painting. I brought in one of my stagers. What did you all think of that day? He took away all my pretties. [KAREN] No, he did not. He was fair. He said I should whittle some things down, which of course we did. And now we have them going to the new house where we have no room for them at all. But I thought he was knowledgeable and nice. [JUDY] He was talking with us that day about pre-packing, which you all already knew and already had underway. I honestly thought that he would tell us we needed to change more than he did. So I was pleasantly surprised. And he was right. I think you all did a lot of what he said and it worked out well. In the end, we had to call a plumber at one point. It was actually when the stager was there, we discovered a little leak. I had forgotten that. I'm trying to fix that, but it happens. So I found a plumber for you. And then I don't know if that was what prompted it or if we would have done this anyway, but we had a home inspector come out. Not all home sellers see the value of a proactive, pre-emptive home inspection. You all chose to do one. You tell me why did you decide to do one? [KAREN] I didn't want any surprises. If there was going to be a problem, I wanted to be able to fix it before it became a problem. And that's where we found Radon. [JUDY] Yes. Yeah, that's right. I coordinated having the Radon mitigation system installed. We found it. Your home inspection wasn't too bad. We had a few follow-up items that you wanted to go ahead and take care of. Do you remember the day he was there, the home inspector was there? How was that experience? Some people just find it nerve-wracking. I just said, please be kind to us. [KAREN] And I think, you know, I mean, as long as people are fair and he was fair. He totally was. Yes. [JUDY] So we had, we didn't, I don't think we did everything on the home inspection list, but you all took care of anything that was a little bit bigger or concerning. [KAREN] But there was the leak in the sink in the bathroom that I didn't even know was a leak because I'd had plastic containers there. And the leak had been contained in the plastic container, but it was like this full. And so it was fortuitous. It was lucky that we eventually discovered it and fixed it. [JIM] Yeah. And he came across a lot of, a lot of things that we weren't even aware of. [JUDY] No, it's true. People live in the home. They feel like they know it. They're living here every day and day in and day out. But home inspectors do find surprises that are often, often people live in there just don't even realize it's going on. That's not unheard of. So that is a good reason to consider having a home inspector come out if you don't want any surprises. And you all were able to have a really smooth closing. We didn't have any repair requests because you were taking care of any of the, of the surprises. You had an HVAC, you were on a heating, cooling service plan anyways. You had the HVAC people come out and do some repairs and the cleaning. And so that was all good to go. [KAREN] And the new owners were able to take over the maintenance contract. [JUDY] They were able to take over the maintenance contract. [JIM] And also, yeah, the choice. The choice home warranty. [JUDY] You had, have you always had a home warranty? I believe you've had it for many years. [JIM] Yeah. [JUDY] I checked with the choice representative and she, she said, thank them for being longtime customers. And they, the new, your new home, the people who just bought your home were very pleased to know that they would be able to get that home warranty. You had used, maybe you had paid for a full year. You would use two months out of the home warranty, I believe, two or three months and said that the new buyer gets the benefit. Now the extra nine, 10 months. So yeah, that is something that transfers over. And I was able to market that and make it part of the advertising for the home. The HVAC service plan that you had a home warranty. You also did some pressure washing. I know. [KAREN] Yes, we had the house washed and windows washed for the first time. [JUDY] Very smart. Any, I always tell people that any time and energy money you want to spend on cleaning is never wasted when you're selling a home. You don't necessarily have to renovate or do big remodels. Just clean, clean, clean. And your home always felt really clean to me. Thank you. So you pressure washed, cleaned all the windows. I think that was a really smart use of time. [KAREN] And then the sun came through and I could see where they missed and it made me crazy. But it still, it looked much brighter after 20 years of not having the windows washed. [JUDY] So when we set the list price, we looked at the comparable sales and in your community specifically, there weren't many comparables. Your home's larger than the others that have been in there. [KAREN] It's the largest in there because we added a bedroom on top of a two-story dining room. And so you couldn't compare any of the other similar floor plans because ours had a whole extra bedroom. Right. [JUDY] So we priced it higher than in any listing ever has been priced in the community. But I still felt like it was really fair. And we got multiple offers on the I thought we were going to be there for trick or treat. [KAREN] And it was like, I think we had the open house on Sunday and we had an offer on Monday. I thought, well, that's pretty good. [JUDY] We did an open house Saturday and Sunday. 26 people came through, which is a really good turnout. And your home buyers at closing mentioned all the excitement of seeing all the other people there at the open house and asking questions and being interested helped generate some of that buzz and energy and excitement. And it was true. We did get another offer from another person who was at the open house as well as some other showings and other interests. And there was a lot of interest. So clearly we priced it right. [KAREN] I know I keep saying that Judy, you're my full service realtor. She came and helped us pack everything up and just, I mean, worked like a dog. And well, this dog doesn't work very hard, but really did everything to help us get out of the house and things that a realtor doesn't normally do to make things easier for the sellers to get out. And you helped so much. I really appreciate that. [JUDY] You're welcome. Would you want to talk about some of the things that some of the adventures we've been on? Well, you mean the clean out guy? I should mention Foxy is here hiding under the table. [KAREN] Oh, our dog. Yeah. She, that was one thing I was worried about is what we're going to do with the dog if people are going to be looking at the house. And, but it didn't happen because we had 24 hours to worry about it and then it was all done. And I like the people that bought it. I think it's a perfect fit for them. And so that makes me happy to know. I don't, I don't feel bad. I will miss the community. I loved the house, but it didn't work for me anymore. It worked for Jim, but not for me. And because of the stairs. And so I think it's going to be a place where the new people will be comfortable. [JUDY] I love it when you find the right home buyer for the right home at the right time. And there was so much goodwill at the closing table, but we don't always get to see that. And it was such a smooth closing. They didn't, they didn't ask for any repairs. They didn't ask because you had taken care of everything because you had done so much smart strategic preparations and yeah, they, they were happy. And it was so exciting to see everything come together nicely. And we got you moved out in time. We, yeah. And that is something we've been talking about for, for a long time, the timing of it all and how we were going to coordinate. So you had an estate sale, just had so many things that you didn't want to take with you to your next home. [KAREN] We wanted to, but there was no room for them. And the estate sale guy was an interesting character. So that in itself was sort of fun. But I think they did a good job too. I mean, they cleaned, they said they were going to clean it out at the end and boy, they did. I mean, they swept, there was nothing left in the house and then my friend cleaned the house. So I hope that they'll be, I'm sure they'll be satisfied. [JUDY] We had had some conversations early on about the timing of when to have the estate sale. And I thought maybe sooner rather than later would just be easier for, to have the home depersonalized and just simplified where it would look really good in pictures. But Jim's point was, we're still going to be living there. We, we're not going to move our sofa, but we need a sofa to sit on while we're still living here. It's like, okay, so we need to hold off. And you all did a really good job of getting the home looking really good for showings and pictures. And then yeah, the timing, Jim was absolutely right, the timing needed to be after we were under contract before closing is when to have the estate sale, especially since they did such a good job of really cleaning out every last paper clip, every piece of it. Yeah. So that was a good lesson learned for me that it can work well that way. So what tips or advice would you have for, for people thinking about starting to downsize or sell their homes? [KAREN] I think the idea of doing your own inspection is a good one because there were a couple of things that, as Jimmy said, we didn't know that there was a problem and I didn't want somebody else to discover the problem. I wanted to see it myself and fix it. So there was no problem and everything seemed to be clean. [JIM] And I think that's the reason in good part that there were no concerns at the closing and requests to pay for certain repairs or... [JUDY] Because you'd already, already taken care of everything. [JIM] That's right. [JUDY] It did make things really fast. [KAREN] And they also had an inspection and didn't, didn't really come across anything that our guy didn't find. Not that they, they didn't ask us, yeah, anything. [JUDY] And they gave us a little extra money. So it's always good. They were 101% of less price. [JIM] Yeah. [JUDY] Highest price ever in the neighborhood. Yeah. It's a good success story. Do you have any, what'd you say about working with Judy Dern again? That's me and the Sage and Grace team. [KAREN] I think that you'd be silly not to. Judy, you were such a help. I mean, just so kind. And so you're just helpful every bit of the way. And the things that you did for me extra were beyond... That's why I say you're my full service realtor. Because you did things that no other realtor has ever done with us before. And it was so nice. My cousin, my friend, and my realtor were packing and bubble wrapping and getting us out of that house. And we were most appreciative. [JUDY] It was my pleasure. I'm going to miss talking to you every day. [KAREN] Oh, you might not be done. I hope not. [JUDY] Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for joining us on how to sell your Atlanta home with Sage and Grace. I'm Judy Dern again, and I love helping homeowners sell smarter with less stress and better results. Who do you know with real estate questions? Please connect us so we can make confident, well-informed decisions and get the best possible outcomes together. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to like, subscribe, and leave a five-star review. It helps more homeowners get the smart strategies they need for a successful sale. Head to sageandgracere.com to learn more about working with me and the Sage and Grace real estate team. Explore all our show episodes. And when you're ready, book a chat directly with me, Judy Dern again, moving you forward with Sage advice and Grace.