Top 5 Homestaging Tips
June 2, 2011
Have you listed your home for sale and been told you need to consider homestaging…but what is Homestaging? In short, Homestaging is getting your house ready to be SOLD so you can get moving! There are a few basic ideas to have in mind whether you choose to hire professionals or do it yourself.
Here are some of the most common tips for staging your home:
1. Disconnect Your Emotions. You need your home to sell so it needs to STOP being thought of as, “your home.” Make the commitment to see your home from a “buyer’s eyes” and proceed to the next step.
2. Depersonalize! Start by removing family photos, personalized door mats, monogrammed towels and other household items that are not, “anonymous.” Look at magazines for current style trends. Most feature open spaces, neutral balanced color schemes and few trinkets or accessory items. One or two collections can make a nice display but it may be VERY hard to find a buyer that cares about your beer bottle collection – if you catch my drift!
3. Remove Clutter! “The home should be cleaned and de-cluttered as part of the staging process. Recommendations are made to lighten and brighten by refreshing with paint where needed, removing wallpaper, editing and rearranging furniture, and removing distracting window treatments. Let the light shine in, and please clean the windows while you are at it!” writes Claudia Jacobs of Claudia Jacob’s Designs Homestaging. In her recent article titled, “Is Your Home Ready for it’s Close Up” in this and other blog posts, Claudia offers many suggestions on how to help get your home sold. Decluttering is often a hard step for home owners to do alone. It is not uncommon to be attached to everything because of how long you have lived in your home.
Removing clutter is such an important step in making as much square footage of open space as you have – actually visible! A more attractive home to a buyer can get you a lot closer to your asking price than a home that is left cluttered. Get everything off counters, clear off shelves, dust off your mantle….leave only a few carefully selected decorative items. Just take a look at these examples from Claudia’s website and see what I am talking about!
4. Make Repairs. Please fix what is obviously broken BEFORE you have your first open house! Nothing is more unattractive to a potential buyer than seeing hanging wires and leaky faucets…plus, they may be hazards that can stop a sale and put delays on your family’s move.Many professionals will advise you to get a home inspection, “One of the most intelligent things you can do before putting your home on the market is to have an inspection done.
It has actually been proven that a good inspection can increase the listing price of your home. It will also give you the opportunity to fix anything that needs to be corrected before potential buyers get in there.” Click here to read the article from a recent Real Estate blog entry about home inspections.
5. Consider Curb Appeal. What does your home look like from the outside? How does it compare to other homes in the area? While now may not be the timing to completely redesign your lawn, take a look at your patio areas and entryway. Taking a few photos can help give you an outsider’s perspective. Can you see your house behind all the overgrown shrubs? How about cutting those back and add a colorful planter with flowers to create a more welcoming space at a low cost. Also, a small well-coordinated patio set on your porch can be just the place for Realtors to sit with visitors discussing your property and how ideal it is!
“This Old House” website has a gallery of, “The Best Curb Appeal Before and Afters 2010” which gave me a more few ideas on how to turn on the charm of the front of my own home. Do take note of the color changes and cutting back of overgrown shrubs!
I hope this top 5 list has helped give you some ideas to help you get your home sold so you can move into your new place. After all, we want you to GET MOVING too!
Have any other Home Staging tips or real life examples to share? Please feel free to add your comments below!
This entry was posted in household moving, Real Estate, Residential Moving and tagged asking price, beer bottle collection, claudia, color schemes, door mats, family photos, homestaging, household items, jacobs, light shine, open space, open spaces, rearranging furniture, recent article, removing wallpaper, square footage, staging your home, style trends, trinkets, window treatments. Bookmark the permalink. ← Relay For Life June 11 – Join us! 3 Critical Office Moving Tips →