Six Home Critical Home Staging Tips for Sellers

The Home-Staging Cheat Sheet

Source: US News and World Report

Six easy ways to make your property more appealing to buyers

Faced with a massive glut of unsold homes, many would-be sellers are struggling to make their properties stand out in today’s downtrodden real estate market. But while the economic head winds are beyond property owners’ control, author Barb Schwarz says they can dramatically improve their chances of making a sale by devoting attention to an often-overlooked corner of real estate marketing: home staging.

Schwarz, the CEO of StagedHomes.com, was a pioneer in home staging back in the early 1970s and has used the techniques to sell properties ever since. “The goal [of home staging] is for the buyer to mentally move in,” Schwarz says. “If they cannot mentally feel and see themselves living here, you’ve lost them.” Schwarz offers six simple tips to help home sellers better position themselves in a sluggish market.

Get them inside. The first thing a prospective buyer notices about a home is not the living room but the front yard. “A lot of people think staging is the inside only,” Schwarz says. “[But] we’ve got to stage the outside to get them inside.” So cut the grass, trim the hedges, rake those leaves, sweep the sidewalks, and power-wash the driveway. And make sure you don’t have too many potted plants scattered around the property. “Nothing dead,” Schwarz says. “You’d be amazed how many people have dead plants in their yards.”

Pretend you’re camping. Schwarz says a cluttered room will appear too small to buyers. “Clutter eats equity,” she says. Schwarz tells homeowners to go through each room of the house and divide their belongings into two piles: “keep” and “give up.” Items in the “keep” pile will be used to stage the room, while those in the “give up” pile should be stored elsewhere. “Pretend you are camping,” she says. “When you go camping, you are not taking all those books, right?” The decluttered rooms may appear bare to the seller, but the buyer won’t think so. “We are not selling your things…. We are selling the space,” Schwarz says. “And buyers cannot visualize when there is too much [stuff] in the room.” Decluttering a home’s outdoor spaces is important, too, she says.

Balance hard and soft surfaces. When staging a particular room, it’s essential to have a good balance of hard surfaces, such as a coffee-table top, and soft surfaces, like a carpet, Schwarz says. For example, a room with a cushy, 7-foot-long sofa, a love seat, and four La-Z-Boy recliners has too many soft surfaces and not enough hard surfaces. “The room is sinking,” she says. “It’s all too heavy.” Instead, consider getting rid of the La-Z-Boys and the love seat, replacing them with two wingback chairs. “If you have hardwood floors but no rugs, it’s too hard,” Schwarz says. “So you want to add a rug.”

Work in ones or threes. Schwarz recommends arranging items on top of hard surfaces in ones or threes. You would place three items—say, a lamp, a plant, and a book—on top of a larger hard surface, like an end table. “You take away the plant and the book, it’s too bare,” she says. “[But if] you put 10 things on it, it’s overdone.” The three items should be closely grouped together in a triangle shape. “I draw a triangle for my clients,” Schwarz says. “I say, ‘Here is the end table—let’s superimpose a triangle on top of it.’ ” For hard surfaces with less area, however, a single item will do.

Decide from the doorway. Since would-be buyers will get their first impression of each room from the doorway, homeowners should use that perspective to judge their staging work. “Do your work, go back to the doorway. Do some more, go back to the doorway,” Schwarz says. That way, you’ll be better able to ensure that each room appeals to buyers.

Make your place “Q-Tip clean.” A properly staged home should be immaculate—”Q-Tip clean,” as Schwarz puts it. “I mean Q-Tips getting dead flies out of your windowsill [and] going around the bottom of your toilet on the floor,” she says. The purpose of ensuring the house is spotless is more than simply making it presentable. If a home is unkempt, a buyer will wonder what other, less visible problems may come with the property, Schwarz says. “They’ll say, ‘Gosh, if they live like this, what don’t they take care of that I can’t see?’”

Broker associates at Colorado Landmark, Realtors can help you sell your home with the best staging and price positioning techniques. Contact Pam at 303-302-8839 or pam@coloradolandmark.com for more information.

Good News times Three – Finally!

I am in sunny Scottsdale, Arizona getting ready to attend the 2009 Leading Real Estate Companies of the World annual conference this week. This year the theme of the conference is The Power of the Bold, which is entirely appropriate for what I wanted to write about today.

I was inspired to blog today after reading my hotel copy of USA Today. I usually catch my news in small doses these days as the gluttony of bad economic news and discouraging headlines has been too much to take. Today however I was riveted to the newspaper because of three headlines.

“Areas of Economy Swelling with Jobs” was the first one that caught my eye on the front page. Hallelujah! How exciting to hear that there are sectors of our economy and geographic areas that are seeing growth. The areas cited in the article were health care, government, education, energy and mining. I guess this doesn’t come as a surprise given that these are areas of focus for the new administration in Washington. Many people that have recently lost their jobs will be turning to these industries, hoping that their skills will transition, or that they can attain new skills without too much downtime.

“Stocks Score Huge Rally on Hopes that Worst if Over” was the second attention grabber. This news has many people thinking that stocks might finally be on the mend. Monday’s rally was significant in that on some levels it doesn’t appear to be a blip. The rally had breadth in that all 30 stocks in the Dow saw increases, and as did all but 4 of the S & P 500. The rally seems to have some sticking power too – the best 2-week rally since the bear market took hold. And all 10 industrial sectors of the S & P 500 saw gains, indicating that industries are healing. This is all great news for people who have been seeing their retirement, college or down-payment funds take a beating. Hopefully this means there is public confidence in the government’s latest plan to “ungum the pipes”.

And finally, “Home Sales Rose a Sweet 5.1% in Feb.” This is the best news for homeowners trying to sell, as well as buyers who are dipping their toes back in the market after waiting out the bottom. Overall sales volume rose, meaning buyers are getting off the fence to the cheers of anxious home sellers. And prices fell sharply in many major markets, to the delight of buyers hoping to snap up a deal and enter the market in what will surely prove to be the best time to buy a home decades. Downward pressure on prices combined with the lowest interest rates I have ever seen in my own adult life – average interest rates for 30-year fixed conventional loans are at 4.89% - make home buying now a “no brainer” investment decision.

So again I ask the question – why are you still on the fence when you should be in your new yard? Is it because you have a house to sell that isn’t moving? I’ll write again shortly about the most important things a homeowner can do to position their home to sell. If you don’t have a home to sell then it is just downright ridiculous to think that these aren’t the first signs of stabilizing home prices. And even if we haven’t hit bottom yet, we are surely getting close. If you think you will hold on to the property for 2 years or more, then this is the time to be powerful, be BOLD! Go forth and buy!

If you appreciate this information and would like more, please let me know by contacting me at pam@coloradolandmark.com. I am the Relocation Director here at Colorado Landmark. I am NOT a licensed real estate professional and I won't try to sell you anything. As the Relocation Director it is my job to assist people moving in and out of the Boulder/Longmont/Broomfield area in any way that I can. I stay abreast of the current trends and statistics and can help you dig up information, analyze your current situation, and make decisions about where you want to go.

Pam Metzger

Director of Relocation

pam@coloradolandmark.com