The Importance of Staging

I've been doing a little research in our office, to try to determine the factors that make some properties fly off the shelf, while others linger.  Price is, of course, the biggest determinant, and location follows at a close second place.  Sometimes, though, it's hard to judge why a house in a desirable location doesn't sell as quickly as another.

That's where it comes down to presentation.  Homes that have "curb appeal", and where buyers can imagine living, sell faster than homes that lack those qualities.  In many cases, that's where staging comes in.  All staging means is that you and your Realtor, with or without using a professional stager, put your house in the best condition to attract buyers.  Decluttering is the most important component of that, of course, since all houses look better--and bigger--when they contain fewer belongings.

Beyond that first step, making the house look neutral is the next most important factor.  To achieve that, stagers will often move out furniture, and replace it with their own, to make the rooms look bigger, cleaner, and less clearly belonging to someone of a given age group.  All buyers have to be able to see their own possessions fitting in well, and even to be able to imagine what work could easily be done to achieve their own particular objectives.  Maybe that involves redoing the kitchen, but it could also be moving walls, changing traffic patterns, or adding on.  Very few people can project what those changes will look like, unless the bones of the house are readily apparent.

We're about to start filming some "before and after" videos, so that you can visualize the process and the results more clearly.  We want your home to show at its best, and to get the highest offer it can, in the shortest amount of time.  We hope that you are open to the possibilities for getting to that point, and we can help.

Adding Value to Luxury Listings

Today's New York Times had an amusing but informative article today about things people have done to raise the prices on their properties. Perhaps the most extreme example was a seller who regrouted the bathroom tile and added $100,000 to the estimated value of the listing, on the theory that cracked and dirty grouting would tend to make buyers think that they would need to do a major bathroom renovation. Another broker told of a client who changed the kitchen cabinets and repainted, thereby getting an offer $100,000 higher than the broker had anticipated.

Most of the examples involved big dollars, but obvious pointers: Get rid of the clutter. Clean the rugs. If you are a landlord, put in new appliances. Replace towels and bath mats with fluffy new ones. Improve the lighting. We all know these things, but it's sometimes hard to think objectively about a place we've lived, especially when the expense incurred will benefit the new owner and not ourselves. It's worth doing things that improve either curb appeal or the initial impact during a showing. Last week's Times real estate section even talked about a new trend of using pets (well behaved and freshly groomed) to make open houses more homey. Who knows? Fido might even replace the tried-and-true cookie baking, to fill the home with a delicious aroma.

The best story, however, was the last example in the article. One broker tells her clients to go out and buy 25 pairs of expensive designer shoes, which will pay for themselves in a higher sales price, as "people want to step into your life". Isn't that like the closet envy scene in the first Sex and the City movie? Well, if it works, what woman wouldn't want two dozen new pairs of great shoes?